New  York  State  Education  Department 


DRESSES  BY  ANDREW  S.  DRAPER  LL.B.  LL.D., 
COMMISSIONER  OF  EDUCATION 


CONTENTS 


1  The  Mayflower :     Fore  and  Aft 3 

2  America's  Educational  Debt  to  the  Dutch 26 

3  The  University  Presidency 37 

4  Address  at  the  Inaugural  Exercises  of  President  James  at 

the  University  of  Illinois CQ 

5  Remarks  at  Southern  Educational  Conference,  Columbia, 

S'C 55 

6  Synopsis  of  Remarks  at  State  Teachers  Association,  1905, 

at  Syracuse,  N.  Y eg 

7  Inborn  qualities  in  the  Character  of  General  Grant 60 

8  Factors  in  the  Making  of  the  Medical  Profession 76 

9  Abstract  of  Remarks  at  New  York  State  Grange,  1906,  at 

Geneva,  N.  Y gg 

The  Trend  in  American  Education ox> 


ALBANY 

NEW  YORK  STATE  EDUCATION  DEPARTMENT 
1906 


STATE  OF  NEW  YORK 

EDUCATION  DEPARTMENT 

Regents  of  the  University 
With  years  when  terms  expire 

1913  WHITELAW  REID  M.A.  LL.D.   Chancellor    -    -    New  York 
1917  ST  CLAIR  MCKELWAY  M.A.  L.H.D.  LL.D.  D.C.L. 

Vice  Chancellor    -    -    - --  Brooklyn 

1908  DANIEL   BEACH   Ph.D.   LL.D.    ------  Watkins 

1914  PLINY  T.  SEXTON  LL.B.  LL.D. Palmyra 

1912  T.  GUILFORD  SMITH  M.A.  C.E.  LL.D.    -    -    -    -  Buffalo 

1907,  WILLIAM  NOTTINGHAM  M.A.  Ph.D.  LL.D.    -    -  Syracuse 

1910  CHARLES  A.  GARDINER  Ph.D.  L.H.D.^LL.D.  D.C.L.    New  York 

1915  ALBERT  VANDER  VEER  M.D.  M.A.  Ph.D.  LL.D.    Albany 

1911  EDWARD  LAUTERBACH  M.A.  LL.D. New  York 

1909  EUGENE  A.  PHILBIN  LL.B.  LL.D. New  York 

1916  LUCIAN  L.  SHEDDEN  LL.B.    -------    Plattsburg 

Commissioner  of  Education 

ANDREW  S.  DRAPER  LL.B.  LL.D. 

Assistant  Commissioners 

HOWARD  J.  ROGERS  M.A.  LL.D.  First  Assistant 
EDWARD  J.  GOODWIN  Lit.D.  L.H.D.  Second  Assistant 
AUGUSTUS  S.  DOWNING  M.A.  Pd.D.  LL.D.  Third  Assistant 

Secretary  to  the  Commissioner 

HARLAN  H.  HORNER  B.A. 

Director  of  State  Library 

EDWIN  H.  ANDERSON  M.A. 

Director  of  Science  and  State  Museum 

JOHN  M.  CLARKE  Ph.D.  LL.D. 

Chiefs  of  Divisions 

Accounts,  WILLIAM  MASON 
Attendance,  JAMES  D.  SULLIVAN 

Educational  Extension 

Examinations,  CHARLES  F.  WHEELOCK  B.S.  LL.D. 

Inspections,  FRANK  H.  WOOD  M.A. 

Law,  THOMAS  E.  FINEGAN  M.A. 

School  Libraries,  CHARLES  E.  FITCH  L.H.D. 

Statistics,  HIRAM  C.  CASE 

Visual  Instruction,  DELANCEY  M.  ELLIS 


THE  MAYFLOWER :     FORE  AND  AFT 

FOREFATHERS'  ADDRESS,  COOPER  INSTITUTE,  NEW  YORK  CITY  1905  IN 
THE  POPULAR  LECTURE  COURSE  OF  THE  BOARD  OF  EDUCATION 

Not  much  is  certainly  known  concerning  the  architecture  or  the 
equipment  of  the  Mayflower.  Not  even  her  name  is  mentioned  in 
the  original  Pilgrim  documents.  No  authentic  description  of  her 
exists.  It  is  surely  known  that  she  was  of  about  180  tons  burden. 
The  usual  type  of  the  English  trading  vessel  of  her  day  is  ascer- 
tained. She  was,  of  course,  a  wooden  vessel.  As  certainly,  she 
had  sails  and  was  propelled  by  wind.  She  was  probably  a  "  three- 
master."  She  must  have  been  about  80  feet  long,  22  or  23  feet 
wide  and  n  or  12  feet  deep.  She  was  short  and  blocky  as  com- 
pared with  our  modern  vessels.  Doubtless  she  had  relatively  high 
decks,  with  cabins  or  staterooms,  at  the  bow  and  stern,  and  a  low 
deck  in  the  middle,  under  which  there  were  also  cabins.  We  must 
forgive  a  young  scapegrace  by  the  name  of  Billington,  who  was  one 
of  the  ship's  famous  company,  for  frightening  everybody  almost 
to  death  by  firing  off  a  blunderbuss  in  his  father's  cabin,  when 
there  was  powder  scattered  about  and  a  fire  "  between  decks," 
because  he  unwittingly  led  Bradford  to  mention  the  cabin  "  between 
decks,"  and  the  fire,  and  the  "  many  people  "  warming  themselves, 
in  the  Governor's  record.  Very  likely  such  kitchen  conveniences 
as  the  vessel  had,  with  storerooms,  were  under  the  main  forward 
deck.  She  doubtless  carried  several  relatively  large  guns  on  the 
spar  deck  amidships,  with  lighter  ones  astern,  and  probably  one 
piece  of  larger  caliber  and  longer  range  upon  the  forecastle.  Of 
course  she  had  several  small  boats  and  we  know  that  the  Pilgrims 
had  a  shallop  stowed  between  the  decks,  which  they  had  to  cut 
down  in  order  to  bring  along. 

Her  captain's  name  was  Jones.  He  probably  had  a  compass  box 
and  hanging  compass,  for  that  instrument  had  been  invented  by 
an  English  cleric  twelve  years  before,  and  Bradford  refers  to  it. 
He  could  hardly  have  been  without  the  crude  maps  of  Cabot,  Smith, 
Gosnold  and  other  daring  seamen,  but  he  was  without  exact  charts 
of  the  western  waters.  The  ship  carried  the  then  new  flag  of 
the  United  Kingdom  of  England  and  Scotland,  for  it  had  been 
decreed  fourteen  years  before  by  the  son  of  the  Queen  of  Scots 
upon  coming  to  the  English  throne.  It  was  the  old  flag  of  England 
upon  the  old  flag  of  Scotland,  the  red  cross  of  St  George  upon 

2065673 


4  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

the  white  cross  of  St  Andrew.  It  was  not  the  present  flag  of  the 
United  Kingdom,  for  since  then  the  flag  of  Ireland,  the  cross  of 
St  Patrick,  has  been  added. 

Very  little  is  certainly  known  of  the  doings  of  the  Mayflower 
either  before  or  after  her  famous  voyage.  There  is  some  confusion 
because  her  name  was  popular  and  was  used  by  many  English  ves- 
sels. If  a  log  of  her  great  voyage  was  kept,  as  doubtless  there  was, 
it  has  been  lost.  We  know  that  that  voyage  took  sixty-seven  days. 
The  ship  was  so  badly  strained  by  storms  that  little  sail  was  used. 
There  was  some  alarm  about  safety.  The  ship  returned  from  the 
new  Plymouth  to  London  in  thirty-one  days.  Many  of  the  Pilgrims 
were  seasick  and  were  taunted  by  a  profane  sailor  who  told  them 
he  hoped  to  throw  half  of  them  overboard  before  the  journey 
was  over  and  that  then  he  would  make  merry  with  their  goods. 
But  before  they  were  halfway  over,  the  hardened  wretch  died  with 
a  "  grievous  disease  "  and  was  the  first  to  go  overboard.  He  went, 
accompanied  by  the  Pilgrim  opinion,  in  which  we  join,  that  it 
was  "  the  just  hand  of  God  upon  him."  The  ship  was  over- 
crowded, cold,  wet  and  unhealthful.  There  was  great  physical 
discomfort  as  well  as  mental  anxiety  and  heartbreaking  recol- 
lections, through  a  surprisingly  long  and  boisterous  voyage. 

But  the  "  fore  and  aft "  is  used  not  so  much  with  reference  to 
a  vessel  as  to  a  history.  The  Mayflower  in  American  thought  is 
not  so  much  a  ship  as  an  institution,  not  so  much  an  instrument 
as  a  migration,  and  not  so  much  a  thing  as  a  memory  and  an 
inspiration.  The  "  fore  and  aft "  of  the  Mayflower  refers  not 
merely  to  the  bow  and  the  stern  of  a  ship  no  larger  than  we  send 
every  day  to  the  fishing  banks,  but  to  the  fore-warnings  and  the 
after-results  of  the  not  very  large  but  very  potential  events  which 
transferred  the  fathers  of  the  Republic  from  the  Old  World  to 
the  New,  and  initiated  a  most  astonishing,  a  most  beneficent  and 
an  altogether  resistless  advance  in  the  affairs  of  men. 

When  this  little  crude  and  comfortless  vessel  reached  a  port 
and  discharged  her  burden  upon  the  New  England  coast  she  had 
made  her  name  famous  for  all  generations.  She  had  brought  over 
not  only  men  and  women  whose  character  had  been  cast  in  heroic 
mold,  but  as  their  instrument  she  had  brought  also  the  founda- 
tion principles  of  a  new  and  a  better  civilization.  She  opened  up 
a  new  and  a  freer  intellectual  and  moral  outlook.  She  started  a 
new  scheme  of  government  which  would  give  the  equal  chance 
to  every  one.  She  initiated  a  movement  which  was  to  quicken 
the  thinking  and  better  the  living  of  men  and  women  for  all  time 
and  in  all  quarters  of  the  earth. 


THE  MAYFLOWER:  FORE  AND  AFT  5 

The  landing,  Thursday,  December  21,  1620,  made  a  red-letter 
day  in. the  splendid  and  fascinating  story  of  human  progress.  On 
that  day  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  first  got  permanent  foothold  upon 
the  great  western  world.  Other  great  races  had  been  in  American 
waters  and  upon  the  American  shores  before.  Civilization  owes 
much  to  some  of  them;  but  they  came  short  in  the  qualities  which 
impelled  the  Saxon  stock  to  possess  the  land  and  dedicate  it  to 
such  a  freedom  as  the  world  had  never  known.  Other  Englishmen 
had  been  here  before,  but  they  had  not  been  moved  by  the  spirit 
of  the  Pilgrims.  Jamestown  was  a  dependency,  not  a  colony. 
There  was  lack  of  wives  and  mothers  and  daughters  at  Jamestown. 
Jamestown  was  Cavalier  in  politics  and  Conformist  in  religion. 
Plymouth  had  even  passed  the  outer  gates  of  Puritanism  into  the 
realm  of  rebellion,  separatism  and  independence.  Jamestown  bent 
the  knee  to  the  king,  with  thoughtless  readiness,  for  the  sake  of 
his  favors.  Plymouth,  with  a  more  rational  love  for  the  motherland 
than  a  selfish  spirit  ever  knew,  quickly  became  a  self-assertive, 
a  self-governing  colony,  which  would  not  only  plant  and  water 
and  enlarge  English  liberty  in  a  wilderness  but  would  save  English 
liberty  to  the  English  realm  itself.  Jamestown  was  moved  by  the 
hope  of  gain ;  Plymouth  breathed  the  pure  and  inspiring  spirit  of 
unselfishness.  One  was  weighted  with  the  narrowing  and  doomed 
spirit  of  autocracy,  and  in  the  face  of  great  undertakings  melted 
away;  the  other,  uplifted  by  the  invigorating  spirit  of  democracy, 
gained  the  force  and  fiber  and  balance  which  are  the  best  reward 
of  men  and  women  who  struggle,  conquered  the  new  land,  and 
laid  down  the  great  principles  upon  which  free  government  must 
rest  to  be  enduring.  .  . 

It  is  a  singular  and"  suggestive  fact  that  the  original  home  of 
the  Pilgrims  was  lost  to  the  world  fcr  near  two  hundred  years. 
It  was  known  that  they  came  from  Holland.  Their  names  and  their 
acts  surely  enough  made  them  Englishmen.  Scholars  had  every 
reason  to  believe  that  they  came  from  somewhere  in  the  eastern 
counties  of  England  which  lay  against  the  North  sea  and  had  been, 
most  deeply  stirred  by  the  war  for  religious  freedom  against  the 
Spaniards  in  the  Netherlands.  Those  counties  were  for  long  years 
the  storm  centers  of  religious  and  political-religious  turmoil  in  the 
kingdom.  They  developed  the  largest  religious  independence  and' 
supplied  most  of  the  English-Christian  martyrs.  Many  from  these- 
counties  had  gone  over  to  the  continent  for  religious  and  political' 
freedom.  It  was  known  that  several  colonies  of  these  people  had 
found  their  way  to  the  Low  Countries.  It  was  natural  to  suppose 
that  the  Pilgrims  came  from  that  region,  but  for  near  two  centuries 


6  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

the  Pilgrim  story  rested  upon  surmise  alone.  The  thread  of  authen- 
tic history  was  broken  and  the  ends  seemed  completely  lost. 

They  were  found  by  accident.  It  was  known  to  students  that 
Governor  Bradford  had  left  behind  him  a  history  of  the  settlement 
of  Plymouth.  It  had  never  been  printed.  The  early  writers  re- 
ferred to  it  down  to  the  year  1767.  From  that  time  all  trace  of 
it  was  gone.  The  historians  spoke  of  it  as  lost,  and  guessed  about 
what  had  become  of  it.  The  belief  was  common  that  when  the 
British  soldiers  evacuated  Boston  in  1776  they  carried  the  manu- 
script with  them.  In  1844  Samuel  Wilberforce,  Bishop  of  Oxford, 
a  very  able  man,  published  a  book — which  was  but  little  read — 
entitled  The  History  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  America. 
It  was  only  after  ten  more  years  that  some  quotations  in  this  book 
touching  Pilgrim  history,  which  the  writer  said  he  had  obtained 
from  a  manuscript  found  in  the  library  of  the  Bishop  of  London, 
at  Fulham,  led  some  one  to  surmise  that  the  manuscript  was  none 
other  than  the  Bradford  history.  Investigation  established  the  fact 
beyond  a  doubt.  The  priceless  value  of  the  unprinted  book  was 
not  suspected  by  the  eminent  prelate  in  whose  possession  it  was. 
But  there  it  was,  still  in  manuscript  form,  the  only  comprehensive 
and  authentic  account  of  the  Pilgrim  colony  in  the  world.  The 
Massachusetts  Historical  Society,  in  1856,  caused  it  to  be  copied 
and  published.  Forty  years  later  the  original  was  generously,  and 
with  stately  ceremonies,  returned  to  Massachusetts  by  the  English 
authorities  through  the  fraternal  offices  of  the  English  church  and 
the  gracious  approval  of  the  English  Queen. 

The  manuscript  makes  a  book  eleven  and  one  half  inches  long, 
seven  and  one  half  inches  wide,  and  one  and  one  half  inches  thick. 
It  has  two  hundred  seventy  pages.  It  is  bound  in  parchment,  once 
white  but  now  brown  and  worn  with  age.  It  has  been  much 
scribbled  upon  by  the  irreverent  children  in  the  Bradford  family. 
It  is  kept  in  a  safe  especially  prepared  for  it  in  the  State  Library 
at  Boston.  The  state  of  Massachusetts  has  rendered  a  distinct 
public  service  by  publishing  it  in  attractive  form  and  selling  it  at 
a  nominal  price.  No  true  American  can  ever  read  a  transcript 
of  this  book  but  with  absorbing  interest  and  respect.  None  will 
ever  look  upon  the  original  except  with  awe.  for  it  must  forever 
stand  as  the  main  source  of  information  concerning  the  advance 
of  the  forefathers  of  the  Republic  from  obscurity  to  the  very 
pinnacle  of  world  fame. 

This  Bradford  manuscript  locates  them  at  the  opening  of  the 
seventeenth  century  at  "  Sundrie  towns  and  villages,  some  of 
Nottinghamshire,  some  of  Lincollinshire.  and  some  of  Yorkshire, 


THE  MAYFLOWER:  FORE  AND  AFT  7 

where  they  border  nearest  together."  Cotton  Mather,  in  a  sketch 
of  Bradford,  had  mentioned  that  the  latter  was  born  at  Ansterfield. 
There  is  no  Ansterfield  in  England.  The  loss  of  the  original  manu- 
script and  the  turning  of  the  u  upside  down  in  Mather's  copy, 
had  befogged  inquirers  for  nearly  two  hundred  years.  No  tradi- 
tion of  the  Pilgrim  exodus,  could  be  found  among  the  people  of 
any  English  neighborhood.  The  Bradford  manuscript  recovered 
the  trail.  The  "  Snndrie  towns  and  villages "  were  Scrooby, 
Austerfield,  and  Gainsborough,  on  or  near  the  great  post  road 
from  London  to  Edinburgh,  now  the  main  line  of  the  Great 
Northern  Railway. 

Now  let  us  go  back  and  see  the  conditions  in  England  from 
1600  to  1620,  out  of  which  these  people  came.  It  was  before  the 
truth  about  the  solar  system  had  been  accepted.  The  telescope 
was  invented,  and  the  first  four  satellites  of  Jupiter,  the  rings  of 
Saturn,  and  the  phases  of  Venus  were  discovered  in  these  two 
decades.  It  was  while  our  forefathers  were  in  Holland  that  Galileo 
W7as  punished  by  the  Inquisition  for  saying  that  the  earth  was 
round  and  moved  in  space.  Neither  the  barometer  nor  the 
mercurial  thermometer  was  known.  The  circulation  of  the  blood 
had  not  been  discovered.  There  were  no  clocks  with  oscillating 
pendulums.  It  was  sixty  years  before  the  discovery  of  the  law 
of  gravitation,  Newton's  Principia  was  presented  to  the  Royal 
Society  in  1686.  There  was  no  knowledge  of  the  original  or 
prismatic  colors,  and  none  of  the  progressive  motion  of  light.  It 
was  more  than  a  century  before  it  was  demonstrated  that  the 
surface  of  the  earth  has  an  orderly  and  geological  stratification. 
No  one  thought  of  water  being  composed  of  oxygen  and  hydrogen 
gases. 

Life  was  monotonous,  slow  and  serious  at  the  opening  of  the 
seventeenth  century.  Eew  of  the  people  could  read  and  write. 
There  were  nobles  who  lacked  that  accomplishment.  There  were 
no  free  schools.  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  with  here  and  there  a 
fitting  school  for  sons  of  noble  birth,  comprised  the  English  school 
system  for  that  and  a  much  later  time.  Most  of  the  people  lived 
in  cottages  thatched  with  straw.  There  were  no  stoves:  even 
chimneys  were  practically  unknown.  Pewter  dishes  were  aristo- 
cratic inventions  which  promised  to  drive  out  wooden  ones.  Table 
knives  were  beginning  to  assert  themselves,  but  fingers  did  for 
forks  many  long  years  yet.  There  was  no  china-,  nor  even  tin- 
ware upon  the  table.  The  weaving  was  done  by  hand  power. 
Friction  matches  were  in  the  future.  Looking-glasses  were  just 
beginning  to  come  over  from  France  to  take  the  place  of  little 


8  NEW    YORK   STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

steel  reflectors.  Underclothing  was  not  used.  The  queen  had 
the  monopoly  of  starch.  There  was  not  even  a  weekly  paper  in 
all  England;  and  it  was  a  full  hundred  years  before  there  was 
a  daily  paper  in  London.  There  were  225,000  people  in  London 
but  there  was  not  a  street  light  in  the  city  for  an  hundred 
sixty  years  after  this.  There  were  no  pavements,  or  water  pipes, 
or  sewage  systems.  Fires  were  not  uncommon,  but  there  were 
no  fire  engines.  If  one  were  afflicted  by  flame  he  did  escape  the 
rough  hoof  of  a  professional  fire  department.  The  conditions 
menaced  health  continually.  There  was  lack  of  wooden  floors  and 
carpets ;  the  dirt  floors  were  covered  with  rushes  and  the  houses 
were  often  foul.  Fens,  forty  or  fifty  miles  long,  reeked  with 
miasm.  Where  the  people  gathered  in  towns  the  filth  gathered 
also.  Bathing  was  not  common.  Smallpox,  measles  and  scarlet 
fever  were  thought  all  the  same.  The  masses  had  no  physicians. 
The  death  rate  was  one  to  twenty-three;  now  it  is  one  to  forty. 
It  was  more  than  two  hundred  years  before  illuminating  gas,  before 
sails  were  aided  by  steam  upon  the  high  seas,  before  railroads, 
before  portraiture  by  instantaneous  processes,  before  cheap  postage 
and  prepayment  by  stamps.  The  forests  were  great  and  many 
and  the  roads  very  bad.  The  few  letters  were  carried,  at  irregular 
intervals,  on  horseback,  about  five  miles  an  hour  and  for  a  charge 
larger  than  a  day's  wages.  When  Elizabeth  died  it  took  three 
days  and  three  hours  to  carry  the  news  at  top  speed  from  London 
to  York,  190  miles.  There  were  no  steam  engines  for  any  pur- 
pose. Of  course,  electricity  had  not  touched  life  with  its  revo- 
lutionizing charm.  In  short,  very  little  of  the  conditions  of  life 
of  three  hundred  years  ago  remain  to  us  save  the  land,  and  the 
sea,  and  the  sky. 

It  was  the  age  of  faith  but  not  of  reason.  Moral  sense  was 
intense  and  at  times  dreadfully  perverted.  To  put  all  the  people 
of  that  day  in  one  characterization  would  be  as  much  a  mistake, 
of  course,  as  to  put  all  the  people  of  our  day  in  one  class.  There 
were  four  classes,  viz,  the  sovereign,  citizens,  yeomen,  and  laborers. 
The  larger  the  class  the  less  control  it  had.  Crimes  were  frequent 
and  were  terribly  punished.  There  were  more  than  two  hundred 
offenses  punishable  by  death.  The  sheriff  was  the  principal  officer 
of  the  crown.  The  gallows  appeared  at  every  turn  in  the  king's 
"highway.  Gastly  human  heads  were  common  sights  on  London 
bridge.  Life  was  much  more  than  austere.  The  pulpit  was 
narrow  and  unrelenting.  The  stage  was  coarse.  Sports  were 
gross.  Social  standards  were  not  what  they  are  now.  The  great 
Elizabeth  herself  was  both  indelicate  and  profane  in  speech.  It 


THE  MAYFLOWER:  FORE  AND  AFT  9 

remained  for  a  Puritan  parliament  to  pass  an  act  banishing  any 
who  would  not  promise  to  attend  church,  and  later  to  resolve 
"  That  pictures  in  the  royal  galleries  which  contained  pictures  of 
Jesus  and-  the  Virgin  Mother  should  be  burned,  and  that  Greek 
statues  should  be  given  over  to  Puritan  stone-masons  to  be  made 
decent."  If  it  was  the  age  of  faith,  it  was  quite  as  much  the  age 
of  superstition.  Ordinary  happenings  brought  the 'most  grievous 
omens.  Witchcraft  was  common  in  Old  England  before  it  was 
in  New  England.  It  was  believed  that  the  end  of  the  world  was 
near.  The  common  life,  the  ordinary  thought,  and  the  political 
institutions  were  impassable  barriers  to  an  intellectual  advance. 

The  religious  revolutions  produced  armies  which  broke  out  the 
roads  for  the  intellectual  and  political  advance.  Luther  almost 
a  century  before  had  denounced  the  sway  of  the  universal  church 
and  nailed  his  ninety-five  theses  upon  the  church  door  at  Witten- 
berg. The  world  knows  the  result.  Calvin  gave  the  world  his 
coldly  logical  and  thought-provoking  creed.  All  northern  Europe 
was  in  a  great  religious  strife.  The  first  great  battle  for  religious 
toleration  in  the  Low  Countries  was  well  advanced  to  its  successful 
issue.  It  was  a  long  and  bloody  one.  The  roar  of  the  battle  was 
heard  in  England  and  the  heroisms  of  the  Dutch  inspired  English- 
men. The  English  had  stood  for  rights  and  fought  battles  them- 
selves before  then.  The  refusal  of  the  Pope  to  sanction  the  divorce 
of  Henry  the  Eighth  from  Catharine  years  before  had  joined  the 
resentment  of  the  King  to  the  tendencies  of  the  people  and  made 
England  a  Protestant  country.  The  Puritan  armies  were  gathering 
for  all  that  Puritanism  now  implies  to  us. 

If  the  England  of  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century  was 
ignorant  and  superstitious,  it  was  by  no  means  insipid.  If  the 
great  Queen  who  had  ruled  more  than  forty  years  was  as  vain 
and  voluptuous  as  her  mother,  Anne  Boleyn,  she  was  as  daring 
and  aggressive  as  her  father,  Henry  the  Eighth.  If  she  lied,  she 
held  the  exceedingly  convenient  theory  that  the  word  of  a  queen 
was  not  to  be  kept  unless  doing  so  would,  as  she  viewed  it,  pro- 
mote the  ends  of  the  state.  If  she  swore  in  a  way  to  abash  the 
troopers  of  her  armies,  she  doubtless  imagined  that  it  had  to  be 
done  and  that  whatever  queens  did  they  should  do  right  royally. 
Any  woman  who  in  that  day  could  gather  three  thousand  fine 
gowns  was  not  lacking  in  the  spectacular  or  in  impressiveness. 
Any  woman  who  could  govern  her  own  kingdom  completely,  and 
at  the  same  time  half  govern  the  kingdoms  of  France  and  Spain 
and  Holland  was  not  lacking  in  assurance,  or  in  force,  in  sagacity 


IO  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

or  in  statesmanship.     Whatever  else  she  was,  she  was  a  self-reliant, 
an  undaunted,  and  a-  devoted  English  queen. 

.And  the  people  were  not  lacking  in  spirit,  either.  Their  tradi- 
tions inspired  them:  the  faith  of  their  leaders  made  their  acts 
sublime.  Their  history  ran  back  to  great  deeds  of  arms.  They 
had  slender  ideas  of  constitutional  rights,  but  they  knew  what  the 
Great  Charters  meant:  their  fathers  had  put  their  hands  to  the 
hilts  of  their  lumbering  old  swords  in  the  very  presence  of  the 
king  more  than  once,  and  they  would  do  much  more  when  Elizabeth 
was  gone  and  a  weaker  monarch  was  in  her  place.  The  Almighty 
was  stirring  these  hardy  people.  Men  of  genius  were  coming  out 
of  the  common  herd.  Those  were  the  years  that  produced  Bacon 
and  Spenser,  Sidney  and  Hooker,  Raleigh  and  Shakspere.  The 
world  was  soon  to  know  that  it  produced  statesmen  and  military 
captains  too.  And  it  produced  men  who  could  follow  with  terrific 
and  fateful  force,  as  well  as  men  who  could  lead. 

Naturally  the  northern  and  eastern  counties  felt  the  quickening 
impulse  first.  Things'  are  always  moving  in  Scotland.  There  was 
much  then  doing  in  Scotland.  John  Knox  had  been  preaching 
sermons  and  printing  books  and  Andrew  Lang  had  told  James  the 
Sixth  that  there  were  two  kingdoms  in  Scotland  and  that  although 
he  was  the  king  in  one  he  was  only  a  very  ordinary  member  in 
the  other.  There  was  even  more  doing  in  Holland.  There  was 
much  going  and  coming  across  the  North  sea,  and  it  was  telling 
upon  the  thought  of  the  northeastern  counties.  Brave  little  Holland 
had  been  fighting  Spain  and  the  Inquisition  for  thirty-five  years. 
An  hundred  thousand  of  her  sons  had  laid  down  their  lives  for 
religious  liberty.  But.  thank  God,  she  was  succeeding.  She  was 
driving  the  tiger  back  to  his  lair.  The  dread  work  she  had  been 
doing  in  recovering  her  northern  shores  from  old  ocean  and  in 
driving  the  most  dangerous  military  empire  of  a  thousand  years 
from  her  southern  borders,  was  making  great  men  and  women. 
They  were  celebrating  their  victories  by  establishing  free  schools : 
they  were  setting  up  universities  upon  the  little  fringe  of  land 
they  had  recovered  from  the  ocean  and  dedicated  to  freedom  with 
their  best  blood.  Religious  freedom  was  bringing  political  free- 
dom. Political  freedom  was  developing  material  resources  and 
industrial  capacity.  The  manufactures  and  commerce  of  the 
Netherlands  had  become  first  in  the  world. 

Spain  was  not  the  enemy  of  Holland  alone.  An  hundred  years 
before.  Columbus,  in  her  name,  had  discovered  America.  She  had 
become  the  most  powerful  kinedom  upon  earth,  and  indulged  in 
dreams  of  world  conquest.  She  was  thinking:  of  world  empire. 


THE  MAYFLOWER:  FORE  AND  AFT  n 

She  was  subjugating  all  the  world  by  methods  so  horrible  as  to 
deserve  the  execration  of  mankind  for  all  generations.  All  Europe 
became  involved.  It  was  the  kingdom  of  Spain  and  the  Pope  on 
one  side,  and  England,  France  and  Protestantism  on  the  other. 
Holland  received  the  severest  blows  because  she  presented  the  most 
intrepid  front.  When  William  the  Silent  appealed  to  Elizabeth 
for  aid  she  promised  it  as  she  did  to  Henry  of  Navarre,  but  she 
toyed  with  them  both.  There  was  no  thought  of  keeping  the 
promise  unless  the  time  should  come  when  it  was  necessary  to 
strengthen  Spain's  other  enemies  in  order  to  keep  Spain  out  of 
England.  That  time  did  come  and  the  Queen  dispatched  to  Holland 
six  thousand  troops  gathered  in  the  eastern  counties.  In  time  they 
returned  and  brought  back  a  new  knowledge  of  war  and  a  new 
and  better  knowledge  of  peace,  of  industries,  and  particularly  of 
religious  and  political  freedom.  Elizabeth  also  brought  over  wool- 
carders  and  weavers,  and  other  skilled  workmen  from  Flanders, 
to  help  on  English  manufactures.  In  all  this  she  was  unconsciously 
ripening  the  eastern  counties  for  revolution.  Men  and  women  grow 
through  their  work.  Labor  quickens  the  thinking  and  clarifies  the 
moral  sense.  The  thinking  and  the  moral  sense  force  an  advance. 
If  resisted  they  start  a  revolution. 

When  Henry  the  Eighth  parted  company  with  the  Pope,  who 
justly,  kindly  and  courageously  refused  his  divorce,  he  went  about 
setting  up  a  more  accommodating  church  establishment  of  his  own. 
Creeds  or  manners  of  worship,  or  protests  against  them,  meant 
little  to  him.  It  was  simply  a  question  of  kingly  or  political 
expediency.  He  tried  to  use  the  Protestant  movement  for  his  own 
ends.  The  result  was  an  English  Protestant  state  church,  and  a 
very  great,  a  very  rich,  and  a  very  autocratic  one  it  soon  became. 

Protestantism  was  for  half  a  century  a  direful  and  continuing 
tragedy.  Its  life  was  probably  saved  through  its  alliances  with 
the  kings.  It  is  not  so  strange  that  it  came  to  take  on  kingly 
ways.  Its  cathedrals  and  vestments  became  so  magnificent,  its 
ceremonies  so  formal,  its  demands  so  extravagant,  and  its  power 
so  subversive  of  liberty  that  protests  arose  out  of  the  ranks  of  the 
Protestants.  These  became  vehement  and  the  martyr  fires  were 
lighted.  Out  of  these  protests  and  out  of  these  fires  came  Puri- 
tanism, as  noble  a  spirit  as  ever  breathed  among  men  in  troublous 
times. 

Its  first  outbreak  was  of  course  in  the  eastern  counties.  What 
historic  ground  those  English  eastern  counties  are !  Up  and 
down  their  fair  meadows,  where  the  walls  and  the  hedges  stand 
in  such  dignity  and  peace,  over  the  beautiful  landscapes  which  the 


12  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

red  poppies  color  so  gorgeously  Briton,  and  Celt,  and  Roman,  and 
Saxon,  and  Norman,  and  Teuton,  and  Gaul  have  shaken  the  very 
earth  beneath  their  feet  in  terrific  contention.  Here  imposing 
Roman  walls  yet  stand  in  mute  testimony  of  a  mighty  world- 
power  outdone  by  the  pertinacity,  the  steadiness,  and  the  heroism 
of  the  Saxon.  Here  great  Norman  churches  yet  bear  splendid  proof 
of  the  mighty  qualities  of  a  hardy  people  who  ruled  Britain  for 
four  hundred  years,  in  the  end  to  be  absorbed  into  the  British 
life.  Here  the  hardiest  manhood  of  hardiest  nations  had  combined 
in  the  evolution  of  a  yet  greater  people.  They  were  ripe  for  great 
events.  They  were  the  first  to  see  the  new  lights  of  a  new  liberty 
across  the  German  ocean.  The  impulse  sent  many  of  them  across 
that  ocean  to  a  freedom  not  yet  ripe  in  the  motherland.  Singly 
and  in  companies  they  went  over  to  gain  it.  But,  aside  from  one 
immortal  company,  they  who  stayed  accomplished  more  than  they 
who  went,  for  they  organized  a  revolution :  they  struck  off  the 
head  of  a  king;  they  set  back  the  prerogatives  of  the  throne  to 
the  mark  fixed  by  the  Commons  in  the  Parliament  House ;  and  they 
secured  the  new  and  yet  greater  liberty  for  all  English  colonies, 
for  all  time,  in  all  parts  of  the  world. 

Elizabeth,  too,  just  like  her  father,  played  fast  and  loose  with 
religious  questions.  She  was  doubtless  devoid  of  religious  feeling. 
Her  diplomacy  enabled  her  to  keep  her  kingdom  together  through 
the  peril  of  outside  foes,  and  even  after  the  destruction  of  the 
Armada  and ,  the  removal  of  danger  from  without,  her  sagacity 
availed  her  to  the  end  of  her  reign.  But  to  her  credit  be  it  said 
that  she  had  the  wit  to  soften  the  persecutions  and  consent  that 
"  heretics  "  might  move  out  and  carry  their  "  heresies  "  along  with 
them.  When  she  died  in  1603,  the  man,  the  people,  the  conditions, 
and  the  policies  came  together  which  quickly  involved  the  kingdom 
in  a  great  conflagration. 

James,  the  son  of  Mary  of  Scotland,  who  succeeded  the  woman 
who  had  beheaded  his  mother,  was  something  of  a  student  and 
more  of  a  pedant.  Of  course  he  was  cursed  with  the  nonsense 
which  possessed  all  the  kings.  In  his  view  a  king  ruled  by  right 
divine:  he  claimed  the  attributes  of  the  living  God:  he  thought 
he  had  power  to  make  and  unmake  laws  without  being  bound  to 
obey  them :  the  duty  of  his  subjects  was  passive  obedience  to 
his  will.  He  also  went  about  shaping  the  church  to  his  own  notions, 
that  it  might  give  strength  to  his  throne.  He  coerced  opinions, 
sharpened  persecutions-  and  forbade  emigration.  His  pedantry 
unwittingly  did  the  Puritans  and  all  churchmen  a  very  great  service 
by  giving  them  a  new  version  of  the  Bible  in  English.  It  quickened 


THE  MAYFLOWER:  FORE  AND  AFT  13 

their  faith,  and  became  the  law  of  their  lives.  It  intensified  in- 
dividualism. It  put  God  yet  higher  above  church  and  state.  It 
made  the  right  of  private  judgment  supreme,  a  cardinal  doctrine 
of  their  faith,  a  thing  to  be  upheld,  as  a  matter  of  course,  with 
their  lives.  It  hastened  the  revolution.  The  issue  was  soon  on. 
Men  lined  up  in  sets  and  factions,  in  parties,  and  soon  in  armies, 
and  the  division  lines  were  the  same  in  the  church  and  in  the 
state. 

There  were  three  of  these  parties.  First,  there  was  the  Royalist 
party  in  the  state,  the  Conformist  party  in  the  church.  It  was  the 
party  of  the  King.  With  coddling  and  flattery  it  upheld  his  most 
extravagant  assumptions.  It  was  the  party  of  the  bishops,  and 
stood  for  intensifying  the  ceremonials  and  adding  to  the  magnifi- 
cence of  the  church.  It  bound  throne  and  church  together  and 
made  king  and  bishop  one.  Second,  there  was  the  party  of  the 
opposition  in  the  state,  the  nonconformists  in  the  church.  It  was 
the  reform  party.  It  was  opposed  to  regalia,  and  ceremony,  and 
ostentation.  It  was  for  purifying  things  with  a  vengeance,  but  for 
staying  in  the  church  and  doing  it  there.  Its  members  came  to 
be  called  Purists  or  Puritans.  It  is  true  that  its  creed  was  politi- 
cally accommodating  quite  as  much  as  religious.  It  was  only,  up 
to  its  lights.  It  was  not  for  separating  the  church  from  the  state. 
It  was  for  simplifying  worship  and  for  purifying  the  church. 
But  this  party,  as  much  as  the  other,  was  for  controlling  the  state 
and  for  being  controlled  by  the  state. 

A  new  force  came  into  the  world.  Puritans  accomplished  what 
they  undertook.  They  came  to  exceed  all  expectations.  And,  truth 
to  tell,  when  they  did  they  fell  into  some  of  the  very  things  they 
had  complained  of  before.  They  remind  us  of  people  we  ourselves 
have  seen.  Perhaps  they  remind  us  of  everybody  but  ourselves. 
The  rank  and  file  were  rude  and  unlettered,  narrow  and  austere 
men.  They  had  much  yet  to  learn  and  their  descendants  have  since 
learned  much.  They  were  not  free  from  faults,  but  their  faults 
were  on  the  outside.  They  were  jeered  in  their  day,  and  they 
have  been  jeered  in  ours.  But  they  were  sound  at  the  heart. 
With  prayer  in  the  camp  and  song  in  the  saddle,  they  rode  rough- 
shod over  king,  and  bishop,  and  aristocracy  together.  They  did 
much  which  they  might  better  have  left  undone.  But  they  did  more 
that  religion  and  liberty  had  to  have  done.  It  is  needless  to  say 
that  here  was  the  great  political  party  and  here  the  mighty  army 
that  changed  the  courses  of  English  history. 

Then  as  is  usual,  there  was  the  small  third  party.  It  differed 
more  radically  from  the  other  two  than  thev  differed  from  each 


14  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

other.  It  was  English  in  feeling  and  purpose,  and  wanted  to 
remain  such,  but  it  was  bent  upon  genuine  and  complete  religious 
freedom.  It  was  against  the  king  because  it  believed  he  usurped 
_English  liberty.  It  was  opposed  to  a  national  church  because  it 
thought  the  church  should  be  wholly  independent  of  the  state.  It 
had  no  favors  to  ask ;  and  it  had  no  thought  of  conquest ;  no  care 
to  control.  It  believed  the  established  church  inherently  wrong, 
and  beyond  reform.  It  looked  upon  the  crown  as  a  wholly 
invulnerable  power  in  the  kingdom.  It  stood  for  all  that  the  Puri- 
tan party  stood  for,  and  more :  for  generosity,  for  toleration,  for 
government  on  a  basis  that  would  live  and  let  live.  It  knew  little 
of  politics  and  cared  nothing  about  place  and  power.  It  did  not 
lack  the  fighting  qualities  of  Puritanism,  but  believed  it  not  worth 
while  to  fight  for  the  reorganization  of  a  state  church  which  would 
not  cease  to  be  a  state  church  after  reorganization. 

The  Brownists,  or  Separatists,  as  these  third  party  people  were 
called,  were  ripe  for  complete  religious  freedom  now,  and  because 
they  thought  they  could  get  it  in  no  other  way  they  were  ready 
to  separate  from  the  English  church  and  the  English  people  and 
at  once  cut  off  associations  which  they  held  most  dear.  Wherever 
they  went,  they  hoped  to  carry  whatever  they  loved  that  was  under 
the  English  flag,  and  there  was  much,  but  whether  they  could  do 
that  or  not,  they  were  bent  on  separatism  because  that  was  the 
only  door  to  full  religious  and  political  freedom.  They  would  go 
in  sorrow  ;  but  their  faith  made  them  go. 

Breeding  and  environment  certainly  have  much  to  do  with  life. 
It  has  taken  more  time  than  was  intended  to  learn  the  conditions 
and  the  thinking  out  of  which  our  American  forefathers  came. 
We  learn  quite  as  much  of  them  as  we  are  likely  to  find 'out  other- 
wise, when  we  see  that  they  came  out  of  these  hard  conditions, 
out  of  this  rugged  people,  out  of  these  ultra  eastern  counties,  out 
of  all  this  turmoil,  persecution  and  suffering,  out  of  this  yearning 
for  religious  liberty,  out  of  this  courage  and  heroism,  out  of  this 
small,  despised,  sane,  pious  and  independent  third  party  in  the 
politics  and  religion  of  the  English  realm. 

The  center  of  the  separatist  movement  in  England  was  in  the 
region  where  the  counties  of  Lincoln,  York  and  Nottingham  corner 
together.  Here  are  a  dozen  small  villages,  no  larger  now  than 
three  hundred  years  ago.  They  are  about  four  hours,  and  one 
hundred  fifty  miles,  from  London.  In  these  villages  a  separatist 
church,  afterward  the  Pilgrim  church,  was  organized  in  the  dawning 
days  of  the  seventeenth  century.  Its  being  was  known  only  to  its 
members.  Thev  worshiped  in  secret,  for  they  dared  not  openly. 


THE  MAYFLOWER:  FORE  AND  AFT  15 

For  years  its  members  threaded  their  way  along  the  bypaths  and 
across  the  meadow  to  one  house  and  then  to  another  to  satisfy 
their  souls  in  Christian  concourse.  The  most  common  meeting 
place  and  doubtless  the  residence  of  the  most  members,  though 
probably  not  the  largest  village  then,  and  certainly  not  now,  was 
Scrooby.  The  American  visitor  can  not  but  wonder  that  so  small 
a  place  could  have  been  the  central  home  of  the  Pilgrim  company. 
In  1.890  it  had  a  population  of  two  hundred  nineteen.  Bawtry, 
one  mile,  and  Austerfield,  two  miles  to  the  north,  with  Gains- 
borough, twelve  miles  to  the  east,  were  well  represented  in  the 
movement.  This  last  named  little  village,  Gainsborough,  is  the  "  St 
Oggs  "  of  George  Eliot's  Mill  on  the  Floss. 

From  this  same  region  another  congregation  of  Separatists,  under 
the  pastorship  of  Rev.  John  Smith,  or  Smyth,  had  preceded  the 
Pilgrims  to  Holland,  and  settled  in  Amsterdam.  Bradford  says  of 
them,  "  But  these  afterwards  falling  into  some  errors  in  ye  Low 
Countries  for  ye  most  part,  buried  themselves  and  their  names." 
Still  other  English  colonies  had  crossed  the  North  sea  and  estab- 
lished churches  in  the  Netherlands  :  but  they  have  wholly  disappeared 
from  history. 

The  congregation  of  most  interest  to  us  decided  to  go  to  Holland 
in  1607,  four  years  after  the  succession  of  the  pedant  king.  This 
congregation  was  composed  of  very  plain  people.  Bradford,  as 
his  manuscript  abundantly  proves,  was  a  very  well  educated  man. 
He  had  had  some  experience  in  the  public  service.  William 
Brewster  had  been  an  undergraduate  student  at  Cambridge.  The 
portrait  of  but  one  member  of  the  Mayflower  company  has  come 
down  to  us :  that  of  Winslow  in  the  State  House  at  Boston.  He 
did  not  come  from  the  Pilgrim  district,  but  was  a  young  printer 
from  London,  and  his  brother-in-law,  Degory  Priest,  a  hatter; 
Isaac  Allerton  was  a  tailor ;  William  White  a  wool  carder ;  Samuel 
Fuller  a  weaver;  most  of  the  others  were  farmers  and  laborers. 
A  ship  was  hired  and  a  day  appointed  for  departure  from  the  port 
of  Boston,  forty  or  forty-five  miles  away.  Though  they  could 
not  remain  and  worship  as  their  consciences  led,  yet  to  go  away 
was  to  violate  the  law  and  the  King's  command.  Elizabeth  had 
the  sagacity  to  allow  "  heretics  "  to  go  out  of  the  country ;  James 
forbade  it.  After  all  were  on  board  the  master  betrayed  them  into 
the  hands  of  the  King's  officers,  who  rifled  them  and  otherwise 
subjected  them  to  the  sorest  indignities.  They  were  thrown  into 
prison  for  a  month ;  then  the  greater  part  were  sent  back  to  their 
old  homes,  in  popular  disgrace,  in  times  of  great  stress  and  danger. 
Seven  were  bound  over  to  the  assizes.  It  is  strange  that  none 
were  hanged.  We  know  that  not  long  before  three  Separatists 


l6  NEW    YORK   STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

were  hanged  for  nothing  but  their  faith,  and  that  the  King  con- 
gratulated himself  upon  having  suppressed  the  sect  by  the 
hangings. 

The  next  year  they  secretly  bargained  with  a  Dutch  shipmaster 
to  take  them  from  a  point  on  the  coast  remote  from  any  town.  The 
women  and  children  and  goods  were  sent  to  the  place  by  a  round- 
about way,  in  a  small  boat,  down  the  Idle  and  the  Trent  rivers. 
The  men  walking  across  the  country  reached  the  appointed  place 
first  and  went  aboard  the  vessel.  A  storm  arising,  the  master 
moved  out  into  deeper  water ;  before  the  women  came  the  plan 
was  discovered,  and  the  Dutch  master  put  to  sea  to  escape  arrest. 
The  women  and  their  little  ones,  in  great  sorrow  and  terror,  were 
taken  by  the  constables,  and  for  weeks  were  carried  from  one  place 
to  another.  They  had  no  homes  to  be  sent  to.  It  was  hardly  a 
crime  to  follow  husbands  and  fathers.  In  time  the  officers  were 
glad  to  be  rid  of  them,  and  they  were  allowed  to  go  as  best  they 
could.  After  months  of  the  sorest  trials,  the  families  and  company 
were  reunited  in  the  Dutch  city  of  Amsterdam,  then  the  first  com- 
mercial city  of  the  world. 

Here  they  lived  a  year.  They  differed  from  the  Separatist  con- 
gregation which  had  gone  before  them  from  Gainsborough  to 
Amsterdam.  That  congregation  had  in  the  meantime  been  led  over 
from  Calvinism  to  Arminianism.  This,  of  course,  was  unthinkable 
to  the  Pilgrims.  Because  of  this,  and  of  dissensions  in  the  other 
English  churches  there,  and  to  avoid  controversy  with  other  people, 
they  determined  to  move.  John  Robinson,  their  great  pastor,  had 
determined  their  attitude  with  a  piety  which  does  him  credit,  and 
he  also  defended  that  attitude  with  a  sagacity  which  shows  that 
he  was  an  unusual  man.  But  they  wanted  Christian  quietude. 
Leyden  attracted  them.  It  was  the  most  beautiful  city  of  Holland, 
forty  miles  from  Amsterdam,  with  a  university  and  a  population 
of  a  hundred  thousand  people. 

Two  years  later,  May  5,  1611,  a  house  and  lot  were  conveyed  to 
Robinson  and  three  others  who  were  members  of  the  congrega- 
tion. The  fact  that  the  title  was  taken  to  four  persons  jointly 
indicates  that  it  was  something  more  than  a  residence.  It  was 
doubtless  the  church  and  the  residence  of  the  pastor  combined. 
It  must  have  been  quite  a  pretentious  house,  for  the  purchase 
price  was  something  like  $12,000.  It  stood  between  St  Peter's 
church  and  the  canal,  and  almost  under  the  shadow  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Leyden.  which  was  established  in  celebration  of  the 
Dutch  victory  over  Spain  through  the  cutting  of  the  dikes.  As 
things  went  in  those  days,  the  colony  was  evidently  thrifty  and 


THE  MAYFLOWER:  FORE  AND  AFT  17 

prosperous.  The  Leyden  records  are  not  lacking  in  proof  that 
they  were  respected. 

Hard  investigation  by  students  has  thrown  some  light  on  the 
eleven  years  residence  in  Leyden.  The  homes  were  mostly  in  one 
neighborhood.  Robinson  and  Brewster  did  some  work  in  the  uni- 
versity. Their  stay  in  Holland  was  nearly  identical  with  the  period 
of  the  truce  which  the  valor  of  the  Dutch  arms  had  forced  Spain 
to  make.  The  country,  for  the  first  time  in  a  generation,  was  at 
peace.  The  Pilgrims  were  at  peace,  too.  They  found  work  and 
did  it.  They  prospered,  met  their  obligations,  and  were  respected. 
They  avoided  contention.  They  set  up  a  church  without  inter- 
ference and  worship  was  entirely  free.  When  put  to  the  test, 
they  practised  what  they  had  preached.  There  was  a  Scotch  Pres- 
byterian congregation  in  the  city.  They  had  fellowship  with  it. 
They  received  English  Walloons  and  French  Huguenots  into  their 
membership.  Better  still,  their  distinct  opponents,  members  of  the 
Church  of  England,  were  received  into  fellowship.  Here  was 
material  prosperity  and  religious  peace  such  as  they  had  never 
known  before.  How  grateful  it  must  have  been  to  them ! 

A  matter  of  considerable  significance  has  been  brought  to  light 
by  the  English  records.  William  Brewster  and  Thomas  Brewer 
set  up  a  Pilgrim  press  in  Leyden.  Brewer  furnished  the  money, 
and  Brewster  some  of  the  brains  and  a  large  part  of  the  nerve. 
They  printed  some  literature,  secretly  and  anonymously,  upon  the 
right  of  worship,  and  the  usurpations  of  kings,  and  sent  it  over 
to  England  and  Scotland  in  beer  hogsheads.  They  knew  how  to 
make  literature  and  how  to  put  it  where  it  would  do  the  most 
good.  The  English  King  would  doubtless  have  preferred  that  the 
hogsheads  had  contained  what  they  were  made  for.  Indeed,  dyna- 
mite would  have  pleased  him  quite  as  well  as  Separatist  literature. 
He  found  it  out.  In  a  fury  he  demanded  that  the  Dutch  officials 
should  stop  this  business,  and  arrest  and  send  over  to  him  the 
men  who  were  guilty  of  it.  The  Dutch  authorities  had  some  need 
of  and  stood  in  some  fear  of  this  English  King,  but  the  Dutch 
could  always  be  exceedingly  deliberate  when  they  would.  There 
was  a  formidable  and  pretty  nearly  interminable  diplomatic  cor- 
respondence. But  the  frenzy  of  the  King  finally  forced  action. 
Then  the  Dutch  seized  the  type,  but  allowed  the  man  to  escape. 
Brewster  was  a  fugitive  for  a  year,  and  was  never  taken.  Once 
when  the  opportunity  did  offer  they  sent  a  drunken  bailiff  after 
him.  and  the  instrument  of  the  law  very  appropriately  brought 
back  the  wrong  man.  The  modern  methods  of  Scotland  Yard  or 
the  Metropolitan  Police  were  not  employed.  Brewer  was  im- 


l8  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

prisoned  for  a  year.  But  he  was  quite  safe  and  well  fed  in  a 
prison  of  a  people  who  had  known  what  it  was  to  stand  in  need 
of  rescue  from  religious  persecution  themselves.  The  demands  of 
the  English  king  for  his  delivery  to  English  officers  were  many  and 
ferocious  but  the  Dutch  found  legal  obstacles  in  size  and  numbers 
which  do  them  credit.  Dutch  sympathy  and  good  heartedness  and 
Dutch  wits,  as  well,  very  likely  saved  the  spilling  of  this  Pilgrim 
blood. 

They  had  in  Leyden  what  they  most  wanted — peace  and  quiet — 
but  in  time  a  new  menace  developed  and  a  new  situation  confronted 
them.  In  the  eleven  years  they  did  not  much  increase  in  num- 
bers and  the  hour  was  at  hand  when  the  war  with  Spain  was 
to  be  resumed.  Bradford  says  "  There  was  nothing  but  beating 
of  drums  and  preparing  for  war."  It  was  quite  possible  that  -Spain 
might  yet  triumph  and  then  their  situation  would  be  worse  in 
Holland  than  in  England.  In  any  event  they  were  more  than 
likely  to  lose  their  identity  as  a  society  and  a  church  and  be 
swallowed  up  and  obliterated  in  the  Dutch  life.  Their  children 
began  to  have  ideas  and  outlook  wholly  unlike  their  own.  Some 
of  those  children  were  already  intermarrying  with  the  children  of 
the  Dutch.  "  We  were  likely  to  lose  our  language  and  our  name 
of  English."  Their  love  for  the  motherland  and  for  the  funda- 
mental rights  guaranteed  by  the  English  constitution  which  their 
fathers  had  wrested  from  the  kings  in  the  Great  Charters  did  not 
abate.  They  mourned  because  of  "  the  little  good  we  did  or  were 
likely  to  do  the  Dutch  in  reforming  the  Sabbath,"  and  they  longed 
for  the  more  general  and  possibly  more  enduring  civic  institutions 
which  they  knew  the  English  flag  ought  to  imply.  Some  of  them 
wanted  to  move  again,  and  to  a  place  where  they  could  have  and 
could  themselves  interpret  and  administer  the  English  law  without 
menace  from  either  an  alien  people  or  the  selfishness  and  officialism 
of  the  English  King. 

About  this  move  they  were  not  agreed.  They  discussed  the  mat- 
ter "  not  rashly,  in  a  distracted  manner,  but  upon  joint  and  serious 
deliberation,  often  seeking  the  mind  of  God  in  fasting  and  prayer." 
They  did  not  agree.  They  divided  in  nearly  equal  parts.  It  was 
not  in  anger.  They  had  no  acrimonious  troubles.  Winslow  says, 
and  his  word  is  conclusive.  "  Never  people  upon  earth  lived  more 
lovinglv,  or  parted  more  sweetly,  than  we  the  church  at  Leyden 
did." 

Half  of  them  initiated  arrangements  to  go  to  the  English  colonies 
in  America,  as  yet  unoccupied  save  by  savages.  Perhaps  if  all 
went  well  the  other  half  would  join  them  by  and  by.  Each  com- 


THE  MAYFLOWER:     FORE  AND  AFT  19 

pany  was  to  be  a  church  by  itself  but  membership  was  to  be  inter- 
changeable, '"  without  further  dismission  or  testimonial "  they  could 
go  or  come  at  their  pleasure.  Not  many  of  the  other  half  ever 
joined  them.  They  did  disappear  in  the  Dutch  life.  After  the 
death  of  Robinson,  five  years  later,  their  organization  disintegrated. 
After  twenty  years  more  nothing  is  known  of  them.  There  is  no 
trace  of  their  English  names  in  Leyden  or  Amsterdam  today.  The 
half  who  came  over  the  sea  ventured  splendidly  and  suffered  un- 
speakably, but  they  cut  their  names  deep  on  the  scroll  of  the 
immortals. 

Of  the  negotiations  and  the  bargains  for  the  "  Speedwell "  and 
the  "  Mayflower,"  of  the  final  farewells,  the  disappointments  and 
discomforts  consequent  upon  the  wretched  condition  and  the  aban- 
donment of  the  "  Speedwell,"  of  the  sufferings  on  the  voyage,  and 
of  all  the  incidents,  and  particularly  of  all  the  surmises  and  infer- 
ences which  any  student  may  find  in  the  literature  of  the  subject,  we 
can  not  stop  to  speak. 

It  was  the  younger,  more  ambitious  and  venturesome  of  the 
Leyden  church  who  moved  to  New  England.  Nearly  all  were 
below  middle  life  and  so  far  as  is  known  but  one  couple  was  above 
fifty  years  of  age.  It  was  a  winnowed  company.  Again  and 
again,  in  England,  at  Amsterdam,  in  Leyden,  upon  the  turning  back 
of  the  "  Speedwell,"  they  had  gone  out  from  others  and  left  the 
less  resolute  ones  behind.  But  for  the  youth,  hardiness,  faith  and 
determination  of  the  expedition  it  would  have  wholly  failed  and 
probably  utterly  perished. 

There  were  one  hundred  and  two  passengers  upon  the  May- 
flower. One  died  at  sea.  A  child  was  born  upon  the  ocean  and 
they  called  his  name  "  Oceanus."  The  young  wife  of  Governor 
Bradford,  only  twenty-one  years  of  age,  was  drowned  and  three 
others  died,  and  another  child  was  born  in  Plymouth  harbor  while 
the  place  of  embarkation  and  settlement  was  being  determined. 
All  told  there  had  been  one  hundred  and  four  but  deaths  and  births 
made  the  number  ninety-nine.  At  the  landing  there  were  seventy-two 
males  and  twenty-seven  females.  Of  these,  twenty-four  men  and 
eighteen  women  were  heads  of  families.  There  were  twenty-two 
sons  or  male  relatives  and  ten  daughters  or  female  relatives  in 
these  twenty-four  families.  Clearly  the  families  were  not  large; 
the  parents  were  yet  young.  There  were  fifteen  single  men  who 
came  apart  from  their  families.  There  were  fourteen  males  and  one 
female  classed  as  servants  or  workmen. 

The  start  from  Leyden  was  in  July,  and  from  Old  Plymouth  in 
September.  The  landing  at  New  Plymouth  was  in  December. 


20  NEW    YORK   STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

They  were  transplanted  from  bright  summer  in  the  Old  World 
to  stern  winter  in  the  New,  from  the  comfortable  homes  of  a 
settled  and  attractive  city  to  a  barren,  a  rock-bound,  and  an  ice- 
bound coast. 

They  laid  out  "  the  street "  where  Plymouth  looks  out  across 
the  bay  to  the  northeast.  Now  it  is  "  Leyden  street."  On  either 
side  they  built  their  crude  cabins.  Nearest  the  shore  they  placed 
the  "  Common  House,"  and  on  the  hill,  beyond  the  "  sweet  brook," 
they  lifted  the  structure  which  was  to  be  fort  and  church  together. 
Next  to  it,  for  obvious  reasons  so  far  as  the  fort,  but  not  the  church, 
was  concerned,  was  the  abode  of  Captain  Standish. 

There  was  little  room  in  these  crude  cabins,  but  there  would 
soon  be  more.  Hardy  as  the  forefathers  were,  many  could  not  with- 
stand the  sorrow  and  the  cold.  In  the  first  year  thirty-eight  males 
and  fifteen  females  died.  It  was  more  than  half  their  number.  Of 
these,  thirteen  were  husbands  and  fourteen  were  wives.  The  deaths 
of  fourteen  of  the  eighteen  wives  is  suggestive.  None  of  the 
daughters  died  and  but  three  of  the  sons,  and  these  sons  were 
in  two  families  in  which  the  parents  perished.  It  is  not  at  all 
hard  to  believe  that  these  mothers  sacrificed  themselves  in  order 
that  their  children  might  live. 

Of  the  24  households  four  were  completely  obliterated.  Nine 
husbands  and  wives  found  burial  together.  Five  husbands  had 
been  left  widowers  and  one  wife  a  widow.  But  three  couples 
remained  unbroken  and  but  two  were  not  called  upon  to  mourn 
a  member  of  their  families  gone.  Five  children  lost  both  parents, 
three  others  were  made  fatherless,  and  three  more  motherless.  With 
old  ocean  behind  and  the  wilderness  in  front,  and  savage  life  all 
about  them,  and  grim  death  continually  among  them,  the  spirit 
of  the  colony  never  gave  way.  Before  the  Mayflower  started  on 
her  return  voyage  at  the  middle  of  April  forty-seven  of  them  had 
died,  but  not  one  of  the  survivors  turned  back  with  the  returning 
vessel.  Again  they  were  separated  and  winnowed.  While  they  cast 
furtive  and  sorrowing  glances  to  the  sails  that  were  sinking  beneath 
the  eastern  sky,  the  resolute  outlook  was"  to  be  westward.  A  new 
nation  had  gained  foothold  in  the  New  World. 

There  is  no  doubt  of  the  intention  to  make  the  landing  further 
south  although  there  is  some  uncertainty  as  to  why  the  purpose 
was  not  realized.  Both  the  Dutch  and  the  English  desired  this 
colony  upon  their  New  World  soil.  The  colonists  themselves  in- 
clined to  the  English  side  and  had  procured  a  charter  for  a  situa- 
tion upon  English  soil,  but  to  the  south  of  the  "  North  "  or  "  Hud- 
son "  river.  Finding  themselves  out  of  their  own,  if  not  of  the 


THE  MAYFLOWER:  FORE  AND  AFT  21 

Captain's,  reckoning,  and  believing  that  they  were  outside  of  the 
rule  of  the  English  law,  they  made  a  written,  an  independent  and 
a  self-dependent  compact  of  government,  in  the  cabin  of  the  May- 
flower, and  forty-one  men  signed  it.  It  was  the  first  pure  democ- 
racy with  a  written  constitution  in  the  world.  Bancroft  has  said 
that  it  was  the  birth  of  constitutional  liberty. 

For  some  years  they  held  their  goods  and  labor  in  common. 
They  had  mortgaged  their  future  to  serve  the  world.  For  their 
transportation  they  assumed  a  debt  which  they  were  long  years 
in  paying  but  which  they  in  time  discharged  to  the  uttermost 
farthing. 

We  can  not  dwell  upon  the  minor  incidents  of  the  splendid  story. 
Life  was  earnest,  severe,  unrelenting;  was  borne  steadily  and  buoy- 
antly. Labor  began  to  be  rewarded.  Quietude  prevailed.  Num- 
bers slowly  augmented.  Spirit  and  purpose  came  out  of  the  gloom. 
Institutions  gradually  developed  upon  unique  and  enduring  lines. 
That  spirit  has  become  the  spirit  of  America.  Those  institutions 
have  enlarged  into  the  distinguishing  institutions  of  the  Republic. 

In  ten  years  five  hundred  people  had  gathered.  Some  relations 
with  the  Indians  and  with  the  Dutch  at  the  mouth  of  the  Hudson 
had  been  -established.  In  another  ten  years  an  additional  five 
hundred  people  had  gathered  and  other  little  villages  began  to 
show.  These  last  ten  years  were  the  years  in  which  Charles 
governed  England  without  a  Parliament,  sharpened  persecution, 
enlarged  emigration,  prepared  the  way  for  a  revolution,  and 
led  on  fatefully  to  his  own  tragic  doom.  When  the  Long  Parlia- 
ment resumed  government  in  the  name  of  the  people,  English  immi- 
gration to  New  England  almost  ceased.  No  other  immigration  than 
English  had  really  commenced.  So  the  little  colony  grew  but 
slowly  after  1640;  but  when  it  was  fifty  years  of  age  a  dozen  little 
settlements  were  on  the  map. 

But  the  tyranny  of  the  King  had  wrought  other  results  irr 
America  than  the  sending  of  a  few  more  Separatists  to  the  little 
colony  at  Plymouth.  In  the  second  decade  of  its  struggling  life 
a  much  stronger  English  settlement  had  been  made  forty  miles  up 
the  bay,  where  and  from  which  the  city  of  Boston  has  since  grown. 
Tn  that  period  quite  twenty  thousand  English  men  and  women 
had  made  their  homes  upon  the  shore  of  the  upper  bay.  They 
were  not  only  much  stronger  in  numbers  than  the  people  at  Ply- 
mouth, but,  man  for  man,  they  doubtless  averaged  stronger  in 
wealth,  in  education,  and  in  the  power  of  material  accomplishment. 
Thev  certainly  outdid  Plymouth  in  their  monarchial  tendencies, 
in  their  aristocratic  proclivities,  in  their  aptitudes  for  managing 


22  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

things,  and  in  their  spiritual  fanaticisms  and  frenzies.  They  were 
Puritans,  and  like  the  Puritans  in  Old  England  they  were  Pro- 
testants against  and  still  the  adherents  of  the  English  state 
church,  the  opposers  of  the  English  King  and  yet  the  supporters 
and  defenders  of  the  English  political  system. 

If  we  grasp  the  religious  and  political  situations  in  Britain 
at  the  time  of  the  first  migration  of  the  Pilgrims  to  the  Nether- 
lands, we  will  the  more  easily  understand  the  distinctions  and  the 
relations  of  these  two  English  colonies  upon  the  rock-bound  Massa- 
chusetts coast  and  the  ensuing  course  of  political  and  religious 
history  in  America. 

Between  the  Puritan  and  the  Pilgrim  was  little  or  no  difference 

so  far  as  religious  beliefs  or  theological  philosophy  were  concerned. 

Both  were  the  products  of  Calvinism  and  of  repeated  revolutions 

and  reformations.     Their  differences  related  to  forms,  ceremonies, 

^methods,  and  to  freedom  of  thinking  and  independence  of  action. 

"But  these  differences  comprise  the  fundamental  and  distinguishing 

• -'characteristics  of  the  American  nation  in  the  world. 

The  Puritan  movement  was  political  more  than  theological.  The 
inevitable  opposition  which  always  develops  to  the  government  in 
a  constitutional  system  took  on  the  feelings  and  the  forms  of 
Puritanism  in  the  British  kingdom.  The  Puritan  protested  against 
"the  claims  of  the  kings  and  the  doings  of  the  King's  party  in  the 
-state  and  in  the  state  church.  But  he  had  no  thought  of  leaving 
ithe  kingdom  or  separating  from  the  church.  He  was  for  con- 
trolling both.  He  wanted  to  march  at  the  head  of  the  procession. 
He  wanted  to  determine  where  the  procession  should  march,  how 
it  should  dress,  what  it  should  think,  and  who  should  be  in  it. 
When  he  could  do  that  he  was  content ;  and  when  he  did  it  he 
did  much  as  his  Royalist  opponents  did  when  they  had  the  power 
to  do  it. 

The  Puritan  had  no  understanding  of  the  equality  of  all  men 
before  the  law.  That  was  beyond  his  limitations.  As  far  as  he 
could  get  in  that  direction  was  the  equality  of  Puritans,  or,  indeed, 
to  be  more  exact,  the  equality  of  those  who  were  in  the  higher 
classes,  for  there  were  higher  and  lower  classes  in  the  Puritan 
theocracy. 

The  Puritan  knew  little  of  religious  freedom.  His  creed  was 
coldly  intellectual  and  it  was  not  softened  by  the  experiences  of 
his  life.  His  visage  was  long,  his  manners  strained,  his  religion 
exact  and  often  narrow,  and  his  thinking  unrelenting.  His  battles 
cast  him  in  the  heroic  mold  and  made  him  an  effective  instrument 
in  changing  world  history. 


THE  MAYFLOWBR:  FORE  AND  AFT  23 

He  was  certainly  a  bigot,  a  timely  and  necessary  bigot,  but  a 
bigot  all  the  same.  He  had  his  work  .to  do  and  he  did  it.  It  was 
his  mission  to  clear  the  way  for  something  better.  He  knew  little 
of  freedom  and  democratic  institutions  but  he  opened  the  road  for 
religious  freedom  and  democratic  institutions.  He  wrought  even 
better  than  he  knew.  When  he  had  done  his  work  he  had  to 
make  way  for  the  more  tolerant  spirit  and  the  wider  outlook 
which  his  singing,  his  praying,  and  his  fighting  had  made  possible. 
The  Puritan  was  not,  by  -any  means,  exclusively  of  English 
blood  and  English  speech.  He  developed  almost  coincidently  in 
other  lands.  Wherever  he  developed  he  was  the  product  of  the 
same  causes  and  the  forerunner  of  the  same  ends.  In  many  ways 
he  was  the  spiritual  counterpart  of,  and  very  likely  his  religious 
qualities  were  in  a  measure  fixed  by  those  of,  the  Jesuits  of  the 
Roman  Catholic  church.  In  whatever  land  he  grew  and  whatever 
speech  he  used,  he  followed  his  faith  and  he  acted  up  to  his  lights. 
Now  a  more  tolerant  and  enlightened  people  than  could  live  in  his 
day  may  well  be  predisposed  to  lift  their  hats  to  him. 

The  Pilgrim  was  a  Puritan,  but  he  was  more.  He  was  opposed 
to  the  English  church  because  he  was  opposed  to  any  state  church. 
Therefore  he  had  separated  from  it  and  he  never  expected  to  go 
back.  He  held  that  kings  and  parliaments  had  nothing  whatever 
to  do  with  the  free  flow  of  religious  worship.  That  was  a  matter 
for  the  individual  man  and  for  religious  bodies  voluntarily  asso- 
ciated together.  He  was  modest,  plain  and  democratic  in  his  own 
proceedings,  but  he  was  for  all  men  and  all  churches  acting  upon 
their  own  beliefs  and  following  their  own  sweet  will.  At  Leyden 
he  received  members  of  all  churches  into  his  communion.  At 
Plymouth  he  did  the  same.  He  was  not  carried  away  by  frenzy; 
there  were  no  hangings  for  witchcraft  by  the  Pilgrim.  He  did 
not  lose  his  head  over  "  Papists,"  "Anabaptists,"  and  whoever 
differed  with  him  in  opinion.  He  was  hospitable  to  all.  The 
beleagured  Baptist  found  succor  at  his  door.  A  Catholic  mis- 
sionary speaks  in  his  journal  of  Bradford's  kindness  to  him,  even 
of  his  preparing  a  fish  dinner  for  him  because  it  was  Friday.  At 
the- upper  colony  they  would  have  let  him  go  hungry,  if  they 
had  not  found  grounds  enough  for  sending  him  to  jail  for  the 
sin  of  differing  with  them — not  about  the  fundamental  beliefs 
in  a  common  Christianity  but  about  the  mere  forms  of  religious 
expression  and  the  mere  manner  of  Christian  worship. 

The  Pilgrim  had  no  love  for  the  English  political  system  because 
that  system  was  inseparably  associated  with  the  regulation,  direc- 
tion and  coercion  of  religious  life.  It  was  using  religion  for 


24  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

political  ends.  He  feared  the  English  crown  and  he  expected  no 
favors.  The  fundamental  political  rights  which  his  countrymen 
had  years  before  wrested  from  the  king  were  quite  as  dear  to 
him  as  to  the  common  run  of  Englishmen.  That  is  why  he  was 
back  under  the  English  flag.  But  he  knew  that  those  rights  had 
been  almost  overturned  again  by  the  aggressiveness  of  the  later 
monarchs.  He  despaired  of  regaining  them.  He  lacked  the 
political,  property,  and  educational  interests  of  his  Puritan  brother 
in  reforming  and  controlling  the  state  for  his  own  ends.  And 
anyway,  he  was  without  the  physical  strength  and  the  military 
power.  His  feelings,  his  methods  and  his  outlook  were  far  from 
those  of  the  Puritan.  That  is  why  he  had  separated  himself  from 
the  state  at  an  early  day  and  was  now  few  in  numbers  and  in  the 
wilderness.  He  had  organized  a  church  of  his  own  and  a  state 
of  his  own  but  they  were  separate  institutions. 

The  Pilgrim  was  neither  an  anarchist  nor  a  usurper.  He  did 
not  fall  short  and  he  did  not  overreach.  He  was  opposed  to 
political  interference  with  religion  and  he  was  opposed  to  oppres- 
sion for  the  mere  purpose  of  enlarging  the  dangerous  power  and 
•sustaining  the  sensual  magnificence  of  the  throne.  But  he  believed 
in  as  much  government  as  was  necessary  for  the  largest  good  and 
the  best  development  of  all. 

He  took  to  governing  as  naturally  as  men  of  English  speech  have 
always  done.  From  the  compact  in  the  cabin  of  the  Mayflower 
to  the  merger  with  the  Puritan  colony  seventy  years  later,  he 
had  all  the  government  that  was  necessary  to  govern,  and  not 
enough  to  become  a  menace  and  a  nuisance.  Nine  years  after 
landing,  a  man  of  the  immortal  Mayflower  company  killed  a  neighbor 
in  a  quarrel.  There  had  been  no  courts  for  there  had  been  no 
use  for  them.  But  the  colony  met  the  emergency  and  proceeded 
deliberately  and  regularly.  This  little  company  of  four  or  five 
hundred  souls  constituted  a  court,  appointed  a  public  prosecutor, 
drew  a  jury,  adduced  and  made  record  of  the  proofs,  afforded 
opportunity  for  defense,  found  a  verdict  of  guilty,  and  imposed 
a  sentence  of  death.  Then  they  carried  the  record  to  the  Puritan 
colony,  forty  miles  away,  for  advice  upon  its  regularity,  and  after 
approval  they  executed  the  sentence  with  dignity,  with  impressive- 
ness,  and  with  sorrow. 

Migration  over  the  sea  did  not  quickly  change  the  Pilgrim  or  the 
Puritan  when  neither  expected  to  be  changed  by  it.  In  the  Old 
World  and  in  the  XTew  the  Pilgrim  was  a  kindly,  tolerant,  generous, 
religious,  democratic,  quiet  and  retiring  character,  who  had  com- 
pletely developed  into  a  Separatist  and  an  Independent.  In  the 


THE  MAYFLOWER:  FORE  AND  AFT  25 

Old  World  and  in  the  New  the  Puritan  was  a  strong,  religious, 
intolerant,  autocratic,  aristocratic  and  aggressive  character,  with 
no  concept  of  religious  liberty  and  with  every  purpose  to  rule 
rather  than  to  leave  the  state.  The  Puritan  came  to  the  New  World 
when  forced  out  of  the  old  one;  the  Pilgrim  came  as  early  as  he 
could  and  of  his  own  free  choice. 

Looking  aft,  it  is  not  difficult  for  us  to  see  which  of  these  peoples 
was  to  endure.  When  the  colonial  union  came  it  had  to  be  upon 
the  lines  settled  at  Plymouth.  The  character  and  rectitude  of  both 
and  particularly  the  power  and  forcefulness  of  one  combined  with 
the  political  principles  and  religious  freedom  of  the  other  in  the 
making  of  a  splendid  American  state.  When  the  American  Union 
came,  it  had  to  be  on  the  lines  which  the  Pilgrims  of  the  May- 
flower had  laid  down,  enforced  by  the  qualities  which  were  inherent 
in  Puritanism. 

It  would  be  as  absurd  as  it  would  be  unjust  to  assert  that  this 
country  owes  all  that  it  has  and  all  that  it  is  to  the  Pilgrims.  The 
Puritans  have  had  a  great  part,  and  other  nations  than  the  English 
have  had  great  parts  in  the  upbuilding  of  America.  Brawn  and 
brain  and  character  have  come  from  all  the  peoples  of  the  earth 
to  break  our  soil,  and  subdue  our  forests,  and  open  our  mines, 
and  develop  our  industries,  and  manage  our  overwhelming  enter- 
prises. Our  flag  is  more  attractive,  our  intelligence  is  quicker, 
and  our  feelings  nobler,  because  all  peoples  have  been  welcomed  to 
these  shores  and  because  religion  is  free  and  all  churches  may 
dwell  together  in  Christian  quietude  and  fraternal  accord.  But 
it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  all  the  others  have  had  more  to  do 
than  the  Pilgrims  had  to  adjust  themselves  to  the  plan  and  spirit 
of  the  Republic.  And  it  is  neither  absurd  nor  unjust  to  any  to 
say  that  the  genesis  of  our  political  theories  and  of  our  religious 
separatism  and  independence  goes  back  with  all  distinctness  to 
the  few  and  humble  but  very  great  men  and  women  who  moved 
out  of  England  into  Holland  for  freedom's  sake,  who  came  hither 
on  the  Mayflower,  and  who  will  always  of  right  be  known  as  the 
Forefathers  of  the  Republic. 


AMERICA'S  EDUCATIONAL  DEBT  TO  THE  DUTCH 

ADDRESS    AT    THE    ANNUAL    DINNER    OF    THE    HOLLAND    SOCIETY    OF 
NEW   YORK  AT   THE   WALDORF-ASTORIA 

Reprinted  from  the  published  proceedings 

Mr  President:  The  honor  of  the  invitation  to  smoke  a  long  pipe 
and  eat  a  Wiener-ivurst  and  drink  some  beer  [laughter]  with  the 
Holland  Society,  and  incidentally  to  name  some  of  the  things  which 
Holland  has  conributed  to  the  advance  of  the  world  and  to  the 
upbuilding  of  democratic  institutions  in  America  was  the  more 
distinct  to  me  because  of  the  fact  that,  unlike  all  of  you,  I  have 
no  Holland  blood.  [Laughter]  But  for  the  abounding  good- 
fellowship  I  might  feel  strange  in  this  glorious  company  of 
thoroughbred  Dutchmen,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  I  have  been 
familiar  with  the  clatter  of  the  wooden  shoes  of  my  old  friend, 
Colonel  John  Vrooman  upon  the  turnpikes  of  the  Commonwealth 
for  a  generation.  [Laughter  and  applause] 

I  have  studied  Dutch  history  rather  attentively  and  always  with 
the  conviction  that  in  the  writings  of  American  historians  Holland 
and  her  people  have  hardly  had  a  fair  show.  [Applause]  It  may 
as  well  be  said  at  once  that  the  story  of  no  people  is  filled  with 
harder  thinking  or  embellished  with  more  splendid  heroisms. 
[Applause]  But  even  under  a  Holland  roof,  I  am  going  to  pre- 
pare myself  for  paying  the  respect  which  I  feel  for  your  fore- 
fathers by  first  paying  the  respect  which  I  owe  to  my  own. 
[Laughter] 

My  father  was  an  undiluted  and,  even  after  seven  generations 
in  America,  pretty  nearly  an  unsubdued  English  Puritan ;  and  my 
mother  was  as  pure  and  true,  as  cheerful  and  gentle  a  Scotch- 
Irish  Covenanter  as  the. world  ever  saw.  These  were  two  very 
tolerant  and  forbearing  peoples  [laughter]  and  very  likely  it  is 
to  the  mixing  of  all  this  toleration  that  I  owe  the  interest  I  have 
in  the  "  reminuisances  "  [laughter']  of  all  other  peoples.  [Applause] 

Hardly  a  day's  walk  from  the  corners  of  the  three  English 
counties  where  the  original  homes  of  the  Mayflower  Pilgrims  were 
found  after  evading  the  search  of  scholars  for  more  than  two 
hundred  years,  lies  the  little  hamlet  from  which  the  first  pair  of 
my  paternal  grandparents  in  America  came  to  Boston  with  one 
of  the  earliest  Puritan  migrations.  For  seven  generations  and 

26 


AMERICA  S  EDUCATIONAL  DEBT  TO  THE  DUTCH        27 

until  my  mother  unsettled  the  practice  each  son  and  grandson 
in  the  direct  line  won  a  Puritan  maiden  for  his  wife.  If  those 
six  Puritan  girls  were  as  winsome  as  George  Bouton  makes 
Priscilla — or  Katrina,  for  that  matter, —  [laughter],  and  I  swear 
that  they  were,  every  one  of  them,  then  there  is  proof  enough 
that  if  any  one  of  those  men  had  gone  any  farther  he  would  have 
fared  a  great  deal  worse. 

But  the  time  came  when  even  the  Puritan  maiden  had  to  stand 
aside.  In  1806  a  young  man  near  Belfast  in  Ireland  with  the 
Scotch  name  of  Sloan  and  the  Bible  name  of  Samuel,  and  with 
a  religion  as  Scotch  as  his  name,  came  to  the  town  of  Argyle  in 
our  county  of  Washington.  Before  doing  so  he  plighted  his  troth 
with  a  girl  whose  name,  Rachael  MacMinn,  was  as  Scotch  and  as 
much  of  the  Bible  as  his  own,  and  whose  body  and  soul  made  her 
as  sweet  and  beautiful  a  human  flower  as  ever  grew  in  any  land, 
that  when  he  had  found  the  place  for  their  home  he  would  return 
for  her  and  they  would  go  and  make  it  together.  The  troth  was 
kept  and  one  of  their  daughters  was  the  girl  who  interrupted 
the  sway  of  the  Puritan  maiden  in  our  family.  It  must  be  admitted, 
however,  that  with  my  marriage  it  was  completely  restored. 
[Laughter] 

I  am  rather  glad  that  my  blood  was  mixed.  If  the  ingredients 
were  not  vicious  or  insipid  it  is  quite  as  well  that  they  should 
act  upon  each  other.  If  the  English  Puritan  and  the  Scotch 
Covenanter  had  much  in  common  they  surely  had  enough  in 
difference,  and  each  was  sufficiently  opinionated  to  dispute  that 
the  other  made  the  world  without  any  help,  or  set  quite  all  of 
the  stones  in  the  foundations  of  American  institutions.  Perhaps 
it  is  the  mixture  that  makes  me  considerate  of  Dutchmen  and  it 
may  help  me  to  treat  fairly  of  the  ingredients  which  old  Holland 
contributed  to  the  making  of  America.  [Laughter] 

A  thousand  years  ago  great  throngs  of  people  from  the  parts  of 
middle  and  northern  Europe  adjacent  to  the  high  seas  moved  to 
the  westward  and  compounded  a  new  nation  in  Britain.  Through 
qualities  which  were  inherent  and  which  were  modified  and 
strengthened  in  the  process  of  assimilation  that  new  nation  showed 
qualities  which  were  then  unknown  and  were  very  great.  It  showed 
appreciation  of  the  natural  right  of  every  man  and  of  the  true 
functions  of  the  combined  strength.  It  developed  both  initiative 
and  self-control.  It  limited  the  prerogative  of  the  king  without 
destroying  the  kingdom.  It  began  to  stand  for  the  systematic 
restraint  which  is  vital  to  security  and  for  the  freedom  which  is 
the  life  current  of  intellectual  progress.  It  showed  considerable 


28  NEW    YORK   STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

spiritual  life  guided  by  some  measure  of  rational  thinking;  it 
advanced  very  slowly  yet  steadily  in  the  arts  and  sciences ;  it  gained 
in  outlook  and  accomplishment  through  doing.  Above  all  it  organ- 
ized representative  assemblies  and  courts  to  declare  rules  of  law, 
and  it  organized  armies  and  navies  and  used  them  to  command 
order  and  enforce  law  more  systematically  than  had  ever  been  done 
before. 

But  all  this  was  the  slow,  heavy,  labored  process  of  centuries. 
Through  all  this  unfolding  the  power  of  the  king  was  decisive, 
most  of  the  time  conclusive,  and  that  power  distinctly  and 
successfully  opposed  the  uplifting  of  the  people.  The  masses  were 
sodden  and  ignorant.  There  was  not  democracy  enough  to  break 
its  way  through. 

In  the  midst  of  this  a  new  continent  was  discovered  and  thinly 
peopled  by  slight  migrations  from  all  the  nations  of  the  world. 
Here  the  power  and  thought  and  law  and  methods  of  Britain 
were  dominant,  but  remoteness,  life  in  the  open,  and  other  new 
factors  which  entered  in,  developed  a  people  very  unlike  the  English 
people,  a  nation  with  ideals  wholly  different  from  those  of  the 
'British  nation.  Frankness  would  say  that  pretty  nearly  all  rule 
became  distasteful.  Foreign  rule  became  intolerable.  Separation 
had  to  come.  Indeed  one  of  the  foremost  of  recent  English  writers 
has  said  that  it  had  to  be  in  order  to  save  English  liberty.  It 
came  by  violence.  A  new  nation  emerged,  retaining  of  necessity 
the  language  of  England  and  what  was  good  of  the  English  political 
system.  Because  the  separation  was  .by  violence  there  was  conse- 
quent hate,  and  the  process  of  national  differentiation  was  prompt 
and  decisive. 

But  a  little  people,  with  such  antecedents  and  such  expectations, 
were  not  to  be  left  alone.  Soon  history  began  to  repeat  itself. 
The  very  peoples  who  a  thousand  years  before  had  sent  vast  throngs 
to  compound  the  British  nation  sent  greater  throngs  over  wider 
seas  to  coalesce  with  the  resultant  stock  and  compound  still  another 
nation.  Each  of  these  throngs  brought  much.  Every  nation  of 
the  earth  has  given  something.  The  differentiation  has  become 
more  and  more  conclusive  until  there  has  emerged  a  mighty  peo- 
ple with  characteristics  of  speech,  thought,  dress,  energy,  business 
versatility  and  aggressiveness,  diplomatic  directness,  passion  for 
discovery  and  genius  for  invention,  religious  sense  and  political 
theories,  which  are  recognizable  at  once  in  every  part  of  the  world 
and  respected  wherever  recognized.  [Applause] 

What  each  people  has  broueht  to  us  is  now  a  grateful  theme 
for  all  of  us.  The  chemical  affinity  has  become  so  complete  that 


AMERICA  S  EDUCATIONAL  DEBT  TO  THE  DUTCH        2Q 

the  sun  has  gone  down  on  the  day  of  apprehension  or  of  jealousy. 
We  have  come  to  see  that  the  factors  of  most  worth  to  us  are 
strongest  in  the  men  and  women  who  honor  their  forefathers 
and  are  truest  to  the  inspiring  memories  of  their  fatherland. 
[Applause] 

The  factors  of  the  American  national  life  are  not  numbers  alone, 
not  brawn  and  muscle  alone,  not  mines  and  farms  and  factories 
alone.  Bluff  and  pretense  were  inevitable  with  a  small  but  nervy 
people  facing  such  problems ;  and  there  were  some  who  mistook 
them  for  the  distinguishing  features  of  the  national  life.  Large 
numbers,  cheerful  humor,  the  genuine  culture  which  comes  from 
ceaseless  work,  the  eligibility  of  the  commercial  situation,  com- 
plete agreement  upon  political  theories  and  an  orderly  settlement 
of  new  questions,  with  the  steadying  and  broadening  which  come 
of  increasing  accountability,  have  compounded  original  factors  into 
a  new  national  entity  which  does  not  expect  to  meddle  with  other 
peoples  but  which  does  expect  to  be  reckoned  with  in  the  general 
affairs  of  a  globe  in  which  we  all  have  some  interest  and  are  charge- 
able with  some  responsibility.  [Applause] 

The  original  factors  of  our  national  life  came  to  us  because 
they  could  not  find  their  opportunity  in  other  lands,  because  they 
were  rejected  by  the  prevailing  political  systems  of  other  nations. 
Free  religious  feeling  which  would  not  be  bound  by  an  unre- 
ligious  theological  system  and  would  not  be  used  to  bind  the 
thought  of  a  people ;  industry  which  would  have  some  reward 
in  accomplishment ;  genius  which  could  do  things  and  throbbed 
for  wider  opportunities ;  imagination  which  could  foresee  higher 
living ;  fellowship  which  insisted  that  every  man  should  have  his 
fair  chance;  scientific  research  which  could  let  in  the  truth  upon 
the  superstitions  of  the  ages ;  unfolding  social  and  political  opinion 
which  was  coming  to  see  that  a  government  must  make  the  most 
of  every  one  and  gain  the  love  of  every  one  to  be  of  account  to 
men  ; — these  were  the  primary  elements  of  our  national  life,  the 
factors  which-  gave  fiber  and  flavor  to  the  American  spirit  in  the 
world.  [Long  applause] 

Of  these  the  share  which  Holland  brought  is  surely  not  to  be 
held  second  to  that  of  any  other  people.  [Cries  of  "Good"]  At 
the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century,  the  opening  of  our  period 
of  permanent  colonization,  she  had  above  all  the  other  nations 
the  qualities  which  now  distinguish  the  American  life.  She  had 
gained  those  qualities  through  a  manner  of  life  which  has  always 
made  freemen  and  through  decisive  democratic  tendencies  which 
even  then  had  been  ripening  for  centuries.  [Applause] 


30  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

Nothing  is  more  manifest  and  surely  nothing  is  more  gratifying 
to  the  student  of  education  than  the  unvarying  companionship  in 
all  history  of  the  democratic  and  the  educational  advance.  Even 
as  far  back  as  the  fourteenth  century  the  independence  of  the  cities 
in  the  Netherlands  had  led  to  common  schools  and  universities. 
The  results  of  the  German  Reformation  were  particularly  decisive 
and  enduring  in  the  Low  Countries.  In  the  early  sixteen  hundreds 
primary  and  secondary  schools  became  common  and  were  opened 
to  boys  and  girls  alike.  These  prepared  the  Dutch  people  for 
deeds  of  greatest  moment  to  the  world.  Work  is  the  making  of 
the  worker.  Carlyle  was  right  when  he  said  that  the  lifting  of 
the  marshes  up  above  the  ocean,  and  the  driving  of  Spain  out 
of  the  Netherlands  were  the  making  of  a  free  and  virile  people. 
It  took  forty  years  of  unspeakable  suffering  and  a  hundred  thousand 
lives  to  break  the  grasp  of  the  Inquisition.  If  the  schools  quali- 
fied a  people  for  fighting  the  first  great  world  battle  for  liberty 
to  a  successful  issue  the  result  made  the  extension  of  the  schools 
inevitable.  Universities  became  the  permanent  memorials  of  mili- 
tary victories  in  Holland  and  the  union  of  Utrecht  was  followed 
by  an  order  that  "  all  the  inhabitants  of  towns  and  villages  within 
six  weeks  find  good  and  competent  scho'olmasters."  May  says 
"  the  whole  population  was  educated ;  the  higher  classes  were 
singularly  accomplished."  Brodhead  says  that  "  schools  were 
everywhere  provided,  at  public  expense,  with  good  schoolmasters 
to  instruct  the  children  of  all  classes  in  the  usual  branches  of 
education."  Motley  says  "It  was  a  land  where  every  child  went 
to  school,  where  almost  every  individual  inhabitant  could  read  and 
write.  Where  even  the  middle  classes  were  proficient  in  mathematics 
and  the  classics,  and  could  speak  two  or  more  modern  languages, 
and  where  the  whole  nation  with  but  few  exceptions  were  pro- 
ducers of  material  and  intellectual  wealth."  [Applause] 

These  great  impulses  appeared  directly  in  the  industrial  activities 
and  in  the  fine  arts,  the  literature,  the  scientific  study,  the  political 
theories  and  the  common  life  of  the  country. 

Agriculture  was  diversified  and  intensified.  Science  was  really 
used  for  the  first  time  in  trying  to  ascertain  the  potential  power  of 
an  acre  of  land.  The  agricultural  colleges  of  America  are  even 
now  going  back  to  those  people  for  assistance.  [Applause] 

Craftsmanship  in  wood  and  metal  and  leather  and  in  the  textile 
fabrics  and  dexterity  in  all  household  and  useful  arts  reached  a 
development  which  was  notable,  and  is  so  still. 

The  Holland  art  of  that  period  brings  us  the  finest  portrayal 
we  have  of  the  best  life  there  was  in  the  generations  when  society 


AMERICA  S  EDUCATIONAL  DEBT  TO  THE  DUTCH        3! 

was  getting  upon  its  feet.  It  turned  from  impossible  angels  and 
men  and  devils,  from  weakling  princes  and  slumpy  mistresses,  to 
men  grown  virile  in  their  country's  service,  to  genuine  mothers 
and  real  babies,  to  the  home  and  to  family  life,  to  horses  at  work 
and  cattle  that  could  bellow,  to  windmills  and  dikes  and  boats 
and  hardy  sailor  folks,  to  golden  meadows  and  gorgeous  sunsets, 
and  to  all  of  the  scenes  and  effects  which  Dutch  artists  saw. 
[Applause]  In  all  of  these,  Dutch  art  was  prolific.  But  it  was  more 
than  prolific.  In  technic,  in  harmony  of  color,  in  quick  recognition 
of  the  beauty  of  the  scene,  in  the  interpretation  of  character,  in 
the  exemplification  of  religious  feeling,  which  was  both  rational  and 
devout,  it  produced  a  distinct  school  of  art  which  stands  in  a 
class  by  itself  unto  this  day.  [Applause] 

Literature  was  not  censored  and  science  was  dignified  and  en- 
couraged. In  the  three  hundred  years  after  1573  there  were  4700 
students  from  England  and  the  United  States  in  attendance  upon 
the  University  of  Leyden,  under  the  shadow  of  which  our  Pilgrim 
forefathers  rested  securely  for  eleven  years. 

All  this  freedom  produced  the  first  near  approach  to  a  pure 
democracy  in  the  world.  [Applause]  A  republic  grew  and  wrote 
a  constitution  and  each  of  the  seventeen  provinces  which  constituted 
it  had  a  constitution  of  its  own.  Douglas  Campbell  has  traced 
a  score  of  the  salient  features  of  that  political  system, — the  powers 
and  limitations  of  the  presidency,  the  organization  of  the  national 
senate,  religious  toleration,  freedom  of  the  press,  manhood  suffrage, 
written  ballots,  free  schools  for  girls  and  boys  alike,  the  inde- 
pendence of  the  judiciary,  the  absence  of  primogeniture,  the  record- 
ing of  conveyances,  public  prosecutors,  the  protection  of  persons 
charged  with  crime,  amenability  to  the  civil  laws  alone,  and  many 
others  which  are  fundamental  in  our  own  political  system.  And  in 
doing  that  he  proved  the  source  from  which  they  came. 

Now  all  tliis  came  to  its  maturity  in  the  Netherlands  just  before 
the  great  Puritan  movement  in  England  and  just  before  the  first 
permanent  colonization  of  America.  The  center  of  the  Puritan 
movement  was  in  the  northeastern  counties,  the  counties  which  are 
against  the  German  ocean.  The  Dutch  controlled  the  carrying 
trade  of  the  world.  Their  seamen  were  continually  in  the  English 
ports.  Out  of  these  counties  Elizabeth  had  sent  six  thousand  Eng- 
lish troops  to  aid  the  Dutch  against  the  Spanish  when  duplicity 
would  suffice  no  longer.  She  little  realized  that  when  they  came 
back  they  would  bring  the  germs  of  a  revolution  with  them.  Into 
these  counties  she  had  brought  spinners  and  weavers  from  Flanders 
without  foreseeing  that  they  would  teach  a  great  deal  besides  dex- 


32  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

terity  in  their  art.     These  counties  produced  the  greater  part  of 
the  early  English   Christian  martyrs  and  the   great  body   of  the 
20,000  men  and  women   who  migrated   to   Massachusetts  bay  in 
the  twenty  years  following  1630  when  Charles  was  ruling  the  realm 
without  a  Parliament  and  preparing  the  way  for  the  notable  trial 
in  the  Parliament  house  and  the  still  more  notable  scene  which 
followed.     Perhaps  those  counties  did  even  better,   for  they  pro- 
duced the  greater  part  of  the  Puritan  parliamentary  leaders.     They 
not  only  produced   old  Cromwell  but  his  regiment  of   Ironsides. 
They  were  the  seat   of  the  Separatist  movement  which  was  the 
unexpected"  and  at  that  time  the  totally  unrecognized  climax  of  Eng- 
lish Puritanism.     They  were  the  homes  of  the  Plymouth  Pilgrim 
Fathers.     No  one  can  read  the  literature  of  the  subject  with  an 
open  mind,  and  remember  that  Englishmen  are  not  very  subject  to 
spontaneous  combustion,  without  knowing  full  well  that  all  these 
things  which  meant  so  much  to  England  and  to  America  followed 
sharply    upon    the    developments    in    the    Netherlands    and    were 
ushered   in   by   the   mighty   fires   which   lighted   up   the   dome   of 
Heaven's  temple  from  across  the  North  sea.     [Prolonged  applause] 
The  Pilgrim  Fathers,  scattered  abroad  in  England,  flew  to  Hol- 
land for  refuge  in  the  very  year  in  which  the  Dutch  arms  had 
triumphed   over  Spain  and   forced   a  truce  of  twelve  years   with 
Philip.     When  they   applied  to  the  burgomasters   of   Leyden   for 
leave  to  reside  in  that  city  this  indorsement,  discovered  recently 
in  the  Archives  at  the  Hague  and  sufficient  to  place  every  freeman 
and  certainly  every  American  under  lasting  obligations  to  the  peo- 
ple  of   Holland,   was   placed   upon   the   margin   of   their  petition. 
"  The  Court  in  making  a*  disposition  of  this  memorial  declare  thai 
they  refuse  no  honest  persons  free  ingress  to  come  and  have  their 
residence  in  this  city,  provided  that  such  persons  behave  themselves, 
and  submit  to  the  laws  and  ordinances;  and  therefore  the  coming 
of  the  Memorialists  will  be  agreeable  and  welcome.     This  done 
at  their  Council  House  I2th  February,  1609."     If  I  were  a  Dutch- 
man, and  as  thrifty  as  Dutchmen  are.  I  would  write  that  over  my 
doorway  in  letters  of  gold.     \ Applause} 

At  the  end  of  the  truce  they  migrated  to  the  New  England, 
coast.  They  intended  to  settle  at  the  mouth  of  the  Hudson  or 
below.  No  one  knows  now  whether  it  was  treachery  or  an  honest 
mistake  which  landed  them  on  the  "  rock-bound  coast."  While 
the  Pilgrims  were  in  Leyden  the  Dutch  settled  here  upon  Manhattan 
island;  then  the  Pilgrims  settled  at  Plymouth;  and  later  the  Puri- 
tans at  Boston.  These  were  the  first  permanent  settlements  of 
civilized  peoples  in  America.  The  Dutch  and  the  Pilgrims  were 


AMERICA'S  EDUCATIONAL  DEBT  TO  THE  DUTCH      33 

weak  in  numbers  and  in  resources.  Up  to  1630  neither  numbered 
a  thousand  souls.  The  Puritans  were  strong  in  numbers,  gaining 
20,000  people  in  twenty  years ;  speaking  relatively  they  were  rich, 
powerful  and  learned. 

Each  of  these  peoples  brought  with  them  to  the  new  country 
the  beliefs  and  the  institutions  which  were  theirs  in  the  old  country. 
The  Dutch  brought  the  democratic  theories  which  they  had 
developed  through  a  splendid  and  heroic  history.  The  Pilgrims 
held  to  the  faith  and  the  thinking  which  had  made  them  Separatists 
from  the  English  state  church  and  caused  them  to  be  hunted  out 
of  the  English  state,  with  such  modifications  and  growth  as  twelve 
years  in  Holland  had  given  to  them.  The  Dutch  came  for  com- 
merce which  was  no  less  legitimate  then  than  now.  [Applause] 
They  assumed,  as  of  course,  that  the  manner  of  life  and  the  thinking 
of  the  fatherland  would  continue  here.  The  Pilgrims  came  because 
of  their  love  for  their  English  speech  and  English  ways,  because 
they  feared  that  if  they  remained  in  Holland  they  would  wholly 
disappear  in  the  Dutch  life  (of  the  half  of  the  company  remaining 
in  Ley  den  no  trace  can  be  found  after  twenty-five  years),  and 
because  they  must  have  the  religious  and  political  freedom  which 
they  could  not  have  in  England.  The  Puritans  were  not  seeking 
religious  or  political  freedom.  They  maintained  class  distinctions 
and  distinguished  between  the  nobles  and  the  commons.  They 
were  an  intolerant  religious  sect;  and  with  the  same  sternness 
which  cut  off  the  head  of  the  king  and  set  up  the  commonwealth 
in  the  mother  country,  they  imprisoned,  banished  and  hanged  any 
man  or  woman  who  differed  with  them  and  gave  promise  of 
destroying  the  harmony  of  the  sect.  They  were  associated  with 
a  party  which  was  the  same  in  the  state  religion  and  in  the  politics 
of  England,  and  they  had  no  thought  of  separateness  or  inde- 
pendence. They  believed  in  the  union  of  church  and  state.  Their 
government  erected  the  church  building,  paid  the  minister,  and 
managed  the  affairs  of  the  church.  No  man  had  any  part  in  the 
government  who  was  not  a  member  of  the  church. 

But  neither  numbers  nor  wealth,  nor  even  scholarship  nor  re- 
ligious enthusiasm,  were  to  determine  the  character  of  American 
institutions.  ]  Applause]  When  the  Pilgrims  ^and  the  Puritans 
coalesced  in  the  colony  of  Massachusetts  it  had  to  be  upon  prin- 
ciples which  started  in  those  northeastern  English  counties  and 
came  to  their  full  flower  in  the  Netherlands.  Old  England  with 
the  help  of  New  England  mip-ht  overthrow  by  force  the  little 
Dutch  colonv  at  the  mouth  of  the  Hudson  but  when  union  came 
in  America  it  had  to  be  upon  the  principles  for  which  those  Dutch- 


34  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION"    DEPARTMENT 

men  stood,  and  which  even  in  the  dark  hour  of  overthrow  they 
never  surrendered.  [Prolonged  applause] 

It  has  been  a  very  common  habit  to  credit  the  origin  of  our  com- 
mon school  system  to  England  and  to  Puritanism  although  England 
has  never  had  a  system  of  common  schools.  The  English  edu- 
cational system  comprised  colleges  with  preparatory  schools  for 
sons  of  noble  birth;  not  until  writhin  the  memory  of  men  of  middle 
age  has  English  policy  undertaken  to  enforce  elementary  teaching 
upon  all  the  children  of  the  people.  New  England  followed  Old 
England.  The  first  New  England  school  was  a  college  and  the 
next  was  a  Latin  school.  All  of  the  New  England  schools  before 
1670  were  classical  schools  established  to  be  tributary  to  the  col- 
lege. Very  likely  they  had  to  bend  their  work  to  the  elementary 
branches  to  make  up  for  what  was  not  done  at  home  but  the 
universal  plan  was  that  the  primary  work  should  be  at  home  by 
the  parents  if  they  could  or  the  minister  i£  they  could  not.  Happily 
they  recorded  all  they  did  but  there  is  no  evidence  of  any  school 
whatever  in  the  Plymouth  colony  for  full  fifty  years  after  the 
landing  or  of  any  elementary  or  common  school  among  the  20,600 
people  at  Boston  for  more  than  forty  years  after  the  founding 
of  the  city.  The  Massachusetts  schools  received  no  girls  until 
1789,  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  after  the  settlement,  and  re- 
ceived them  for  only  half  time  for  forty  years  after  that.  The 
Puritans  had  nothing  in  common  with  other  people.  How  were 
they  to  have  common  schools?  If  the  old  heroes  could  return  to 
earth  and  hear  some  things  which  their  descendants  claim  there 
would  be  some  castigations  without  formal  trials  if  not  some  hang- 
ings without  the  benefit  of  clergy.  [Laughter] 

The  Dutch  colonial  charter  of  1629  decreed  that  "  the  colonists 
shall,  in  the  speediest  manner,  endeavor  to  find  out  ways  and 
means  to  support  a  minister  and  a  schoolmaster  that  thus  the 
service  of  God  and  zeal  for  religion  may  not  grow  cold  and  be 
neglected  among  them."  That  is  quite  as  good  as  the  phrase 
about  not  letting  learning  "  perish  in  the  graves  of  their  fathers  " 
in  the  Massachusetts  law  enacted  18  years  later.  [Applause] 
A  Dutch  schoolmaster  was  an  official  of  the  state  and  when  he 
was  sent  a  school  resulted.  Upon  the  petition  of  the  colonists 
an  official  schoolmaster  was  sent  over  from  Holland  in  1633  and 
a  school  was  opened  upon  this  island  of  Manhattan.  It  was  the 
first  school  of  which  there  is  any  record  in  America.  It  was  open 
to  all  and  it  was  supported  out  of  the  common  moneys  of  the 
colony.  It  has  continued  under  changing  political  conditions  and 
therefore  tinder  differing:  auspices  until  this  day.  Other  similar 


AMERICA'S  EDUCATIONAL  DEBT  TO  THE  DUTCH      35 

schools,  two  public  schools  of  secondary  grade,  and  a  dozen  schools 
under  private  management  with  the  government  approval,  were 
established  upon  this  island  in  the  thirty  years  before  the  English 
arms  took  possession  of  it.  [Applause] 

In  the  ensuing  century  and  down  to  the  opening  of  the  Revolu- 
tion the  English  royal  governor  and  the  Dutch  colonial  legislature 
were  in  frequent  conflict  over  schools.  The  result  was  that  prac- 
tically nothing  was  done.  No  act  of  the  English  government  favor- 
able to  schools  appears  in  all  that  time  except  the  reluctant  approval 
of  two  Latin  schools  for  limited  periods ;  there  was  no  act  and 
no  consent  which  was  inconsistent  with  the  uniform  English  policy 
of  advanced  schools  for  the  nobles  and  no  schools  at  all  for  the 
people. 

If  the  democratic  advance  and  the  common  enlightenment  first 
brought  from  Holland  to  America  the  germs  of  the  great  free 
elementary  school  system  of  the  country  and  give  New  York  the 
honor  of  the  first  free  school  of  the  land,  her  Dutch  antecedents 
give  New  York  her  primacy  in  being  the  first  state  to  appropriate 
state  moneys  to  encourage  primary  education,  the  first  to  establish 
state  supervision  of  schools,  and  the  first  to  relate  all  the  schools 
in  a  uniform  system  which  has  become  universal.  [Applause] 

And  surely  there  is  something  of  their  differing  origins  signi- 
fied in  the  fact  that  all  of  her  sister  states  preceded  Massachusetts 
in  writing  the  guaranty  of  religious  freedom  in  their  constitutions; 
while  New  York,  which  never  had  a  state  church  and  was  never 
tinctured  with  intolerance,  was  the  first  organized  government 
in  the  world  to  enshrine  in  her  fundamental  law  the  sacred  pledge 
of  absolute  spiritual  independence  and  of  political  action  without 
ecclesiastical  intervention.  [Applause] 

But  it  must  not  be  surmised  that  the  forefathers  of  the  Holland 
Society  were  an  unreligious  people.  There  were  forty  editions 
of  the  Bible  or  of  the  New  Testament  printed  in  Holland  before 
there  was  one  in  England.  It  was  their  religion  which  made 
them  refuse  to  permit  their  religion  to  be  bound,  which  enabled 
them  to  anticipate  by  two  hundred  years  the  attitude  of  America 
and  refused  to  be  taxed  without  their  corfsent,  which  impelled 
them,  with  little  return  save  the  duplicity  of  the  English  queen, 
to  stand  as  the  shield  and  helper  of  England  until  the  very  seas 
were  crimson  with  their  blood.  It  was  their  religion  which  led 
them  to  become  the  heroic  and  historic  representatives  of  the 
principles  upon  which  democracy  may  advance  and  free  institu- 
tions may  endure.  [Applause] 

3 


36  NfcW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

The  Dutch  were  a  little  people  but  they  were  greater  than  the 
largest.  Their  thinking,  their  religion,  and  their  valor  broke  out 
ihe  roads  over  which  democracy  was  to  find  the  way  to  a  new 
civilization.  All  Americans  are  under  special  and  enduring  obliga- 
tions to  them  for  surely  they  were  the  first  to  declare  the  funda- 
mental principles  of  our  Republic.  [Long  applause] 


THE  UNIVERSITY  PRESIDENCY 

ADDRESS  AT  NATIONAL  CONFERENCE  OF  UNIVERSITY  TRUSTEES  AT 
THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS  IN  CONNECTION  WITH  THE 
INAUGURATION  OF  PRESIDENT  JAMES 

By  courtesy  of  the  Atlantic  Monthly 

There  are  at  least  four  features  which  distinguish  university  work 
in  America  and  exercise  a  decisive  influence  upon  the  form  of 
government  in  American  universities. 

The  first  grows  out  of  the  universal  democracy  of  the  country 
and  the  common  ambitions  of  the  people.  Every  one  who  shares 
in  the  spirit  of  the  country  wants  to  go  to  the  top  and  continually 
hears  that  he  may  if  he  will  seize  his  opportunities.  He  has  no 
thought  of  following  his  father's  work  unless,  as  is  quite  improb- 
able, it  is  in  line  with  his  special  ambitions.  The  need  of  the  best 
training  is  now  everywhere  recognized.  The  secondary  schools 
have  become  a  part  of  the  common  school  system  and  every  teacher 
in  high  school  or  academy  leads  his  students  very  near  to  the  point 
of  thinking  that  they  will  lose  their  chance  in  life  and  even  be 
discredited  if  they  do  not  advance  to  college  or  university.  The 
university  life  is  now  specially  attractive  to  the  young  and  they 
want  a  share  in  the  pleasure  and  enthusiasm  of  it.  This  brings 
to  the  universities  great  numbers  who  in  other  days  never  went 
to  college ;  who  in  other  lands  would  not  go  now.  Many  of  these 
must  be  both  led  and  pushed. 

Then,  the  common  thought  about  liberal  education  has  changed. 
It  is  no  longer  only  classical,  culturing,  disciplinary ;  it  must  pre- 
pare students  not  only  for  the  multiplying  professions  but  for  the 
multiplying  industries.  It  trains  one  for  work  which  may  dis- 
tinguish him.  Cultivated  aimlessness  is  no  longer  the  accepted1 
ideal  of  American  scholarship.  Culture  which  is  not  the  product 
of  work,  either  mental  or  manual,  with  some  definite  point  to  it, 
is  held  to  be  at  secondhand,  only  skin-deep,  and  not  to  be  taken 
seriously.  It  must  not  be  said  that  mere  strength  and  steadiness 
in  holding  a  job  are  the  marks  of  an  educated  man.  There  must 
be  native  resourcefulness  and  versatility,  sound  training  and  serious: 
study,  discrimination  in  means  and  methods,  and  rational  appli- 
cation to  real  things  in  life  in  ways  that  bring  results  of  some 
distinct  worth  to  the  world.  It  makes  little  difference  what  one 
does,  but  he  must  do  something.  The  all-important  fact  is  not 

37 


38  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

that  real  learning  may  now  be  found  in  all  businesses — though 
that  is  important — but  that  one  must  do  something  of  recognized 
value  to  be  held  a  scholar.  It  may  be  not  only  in  letters,  or  science, 
or  law,  or  medicine,  or  theology,  but  it  may  also  be  in  administra- 
tion, in  planning  and  constructing,  in  mechanics,  in  agriculture, 
.in  banking,  in  public  service,  in  anything  else  worth  while. 

If  one's  powers  of  observation,  of  investigation,  of  expression 
and  of  accomplishment,  lead  him  to  do  something  of  real  concern, 
to  do  it  completely  and  quite  as  well  as,  or  better  than,  others  can 
do  it,  and  impel  him  to  open  up  new  vistas  and  methods  of  doing 
other  things  of  larger  moment,  he  has  a  better  right  to  be  held 
an  educated  man  than  he  who  incubates  the  unattainable  and  brings 
forth  nothing.  And  not  only  have  educational  values  changed, 
but  educational  instrumentalities  have  changed.  Books  and  aca- 
demic discussions  have  their  part,  but  in  many  directions  it  is 
now  a  minor  part.  Things  are  taught  and  learned,  new  insight 
and  the  power  to  do  are  gained,  through  actual  doing.  And  not 
only  is  the  training  through  doing  rather  than  through  reading 
and  talking  but  the  opportunity  of  selection  extends  to  every  sub- 
ject and  every  study.  It  requires  buildings  and  equipment  and 
teachers  never  before  within  the  means  of  an  institution.  It  has 
revolutionized  the  scope,  the  possessions,  the  plans  and  methods,  the 
offerings  and  the  outlook  of  the  universities.  While  this  is  com- 
ing to  be  true  in  a  measure  in  other  countries,  the  unconventional 
freedom,  the  industrial  aggressiveness,  and  the  unparalleled  volume 
of  money  going  into  university  operations  in  this  country  have 
given  us  the  leadership  of  a  world  movement  in  higher  education. 

Again,  university  revenues  come  from  men  who  have  done  things 
and  want  other  things  done.  It  is  exclusively  so  in  the  private 
institutions,  and  the  people  and  their  representatives  who  vote 
appropriations  to  the  state  universities  have  no  other  thought. 
While  few  are  so  short-sighted  as  to  be  opposed  to  a  balanced  and 
harmonious  university  evolution,  still  money  is  provided  more  freely 
for  the  kinds  of  instruction  in  which  the  providers  are  most  inter- 
ested. This,  of  course,  gives  shape  and  trend  to  the  development. 
But  it  does  more:  it  creates  the  need  of  teachers  not  heretofore 
adequately  prepared  or  not  prepared  in  adequate  numbers.  The 
vastness,  the  newness  and  the  unpreparedness  of  it  all  create  the 
need  of  general  oversight  and  close  administration.  Even  more, 
when  teachers  are  not  supported  by  student  fees,  but  are  paid 
from  the  university  treasury  without  reference  to  the  number  of 
students  they  have  or  very  sharp  discrimination  about  the  quality 
of  work  they  do,  there  is  no  automatic  way  of  getting  rid  of 


THE    UNIVERSITY    PRESIDENCY  39 

teachers  who  do  not  teach  or  of  investigators  who  do  not  produce. 
Some  competent  and  protected  authority  must  accomplish  this  and 
continually  reinforce  the  teaching  staff  with  virile  men.  The 
competition  between  institutions  rather  than  between  men,  and 
the  natural  reluctance  at  deposing  a  teacher,  are  producing  pathetic 
situations  at  different  points  in  many  American  universities  and 
are  likely  to  become  the  occasion  of  more  weakness  in  our  university 
system  than  has  been  widely  realized. 

Yet  again,  the  sentiment  of  this  country  does  not  agree,  and 
doubtless  will  never  agree,  that  American  universities  shall  stand 
for  more  "  scholarship "  without  reference  to  character,  or  that 
boys  shall  be  allowed  to  go  to  the  devil  without  hindrance  for 
the  lack  of  university  leadership  or  to  accommodate  administrative 
cowardice  or  convenience.  Students  will  have  to  be  controlled 
and  guided  in  this  country,  and  American  universities  will  have 
to  have  leaders  who  are  leaders  of  morals  as  well  as  of  learning 
and  who  will  stir  the  common  sense  and  use  the  common  senti- 
ment through  the  authoritative  word  spoken  in  the  crowd. 

One  may  lament  that  our  universities  are  not  copied  upon  Ger- 
man or  English  models  ;  that  overwhelming  numbers  of  students 
are  going  to  them ;  that  all  who  go  are  not  serious  students ;  that 
we  are  moving  in  new  educational  directions;  that  our  professors 
are  not  made  to  live  on  fees;  and  that  there  is  neither  a  care 
for  superficial  culture  without  much  regard  for  true  scholarship, 
nor  a  vaunting  of  mere  scholarship  without  reference  to  moral 
character.  The  labor  is  lost.  These  things  are  so ;  they  are  right 
because  they  are  so;  because  they  are  the  outgrowth  of  the  com- 
pounding of  a  great  new  nation  in  the  world  and  because  they  are 
the  logical  outworkings  of  a  marvelous  advance  in  the  thinking; 
of  men  who  are  free  to  do  some  thinking  for  themselves. 

It  is  hardly  worth  while  to  be  troubled  because  we  can  not  see 
the  road  beyond  the  turns  that  are  ahead.  There  is  a  road  beyond 
the  turns — or  one  will  be  made.  President  Pritchett  of  the  Massa- 
chusetts Institute,  in  a  recent  address  at  the  University  of  Michi- 
gan, published  in  the  September  Atlantic,  discusses,  without 
answering,  the  question — "  Shall  the  University  become  a  business 
corporation?"  Dr  Pritchett  ordinarily  does  things  exactly  and" 
completely.  He  can  answer  questions — particularly  when  he  asks 
them  of  himself.  He  did  not  answer  this  one  because  the  answer 
is  so  obvious.  He  used  his  question  to  express  a  very  common 
skepticism.  Of  course  the  university  can  not  become  a  business 
corporation  with  a  business  corporation's  ordinary  implications. 
Such  a  corporation  is  without  what  is  being  called  spiritual  aim — 


40  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

is  without  moral  methods.  Universities  are  to  unlock  the  truth 
and  turn  out  the  test  and  the  greatest  men  and  women;  business 
corporations  are  mainly  to  make  money.  If  this  is  a  harsh  char- 
acterization, it  can  not  be  denied  that  it  has  been  earned  by 
the  great  business  corporations  with  which  the  great  uni- 
versities must  be  compared  if  they  are  to  be  compared  with  any. 
A  university  can  not  become  such  a  corporation  without  ceasing 
to  be  a  university. 

The  distinguishing  earmarks  of  an  American  university  are  its 
moral  purpose,  its  scientific  aim,  its  unselfish  public  service,  its 
inspirations  to  all  men  in  all  noble  things,  and  its  incorruptibility 
by  commercialism.  But  that  is  no  reason  why  sane  and  essential 
business  methods  should  not  be  applied  to  the  management  of  its 
business  affairs.  It  is  a  business  concern  as  well  as  a  moral  and 
intellectual  instrumentality  and  if  business  methods  are  not  applied 
to  its  management  it  will  break  down.  If  they  are  not  to  be 
employed,  the  university  with  its  vast  accumulations  of  materials 
and  men  must  be  a  mistake  or,  worse  yet,  a  wrong.  It  is  neither 
a  mistake  nor  a  wrong  or  it  would  not  be  here.  It  is  neither 
an  accident  nor  an  impulse:  it  is  a  growth,  the  deliberate  product 
of  conditions,  of  means  and  of  thought.  It  is  a  great  combina- 
tion of  material  resources  and  moral  forces  essential  to  modern 
competitions,  the  needed  inspiration  of  all  factors  in  the  popula- 
tion for  large  areas  of  territory,  and  its  usefulness  depends  upon 
giving  the  management  both  moral  sense  and  worldly  knowledge. 

The  responsible  authorities  in  the  management  of  a  university 
are  the  trustees,  the  president,  and  the  faculty.  Legal  enactments 
settle  in  some  measure  the  exact  functions  of  each,  but  common 
knowledge  of  the  kinds  of  government  which  succeed  when  much 
property  and  many  interests  are  involved,  as  well  as  the  imperative 
necessities  of  the  particular  situation,  have  gone  much  further  to 
establish  the  governmental  procedure  in  the  university.  While  the 
immediate  purpose  is  to  exploit  the  functions  and  powers  of  the 
university  president,  some  reference,  necessarily  brief,  must  be 
made  to  the  prerogatives  and  duties  of  the  trustees  and  faculty. 

A  vital  principle  in  all  government  involving  many  cares  and 
interests  is  tersely  expressed  in  the  statement  that  bodies  legislate 
and  individuals  execute.  It  goes  without  saying  that  legislation 
must  be  by  a  body  which  is  both  morally  responsible  and  legally 
competent,  and  common  observation  proves  to  us  that  it  must  con- 
cern a  real  situation,  to  be  of  any  real  worth.  If  it  involves  special 
knowledge,  it  must  be  by  men  who  have  the  knowledge  or  who 
will  respect  the  opinions  of  others  who  have. 


THE    UNIVERSITY    PRESIDENCY  4! 

The  trustees  of  a  university  are  charged  by  law,  either  statutory 
or  judge-made,  or  by  widely  acknowledged  usage,  with  that  general 
oversight  and  that  legislative  direction  which  will  make  sure  of 
the  true  execution  of  the  trust.  They  are  to  secure  revenues  and 
control  expenditures.  They  are  to  prevent  waste  and  assure  results. 
They  are  never  to  forget  that  they  represent  the  people  who 
created  and  who  maintain  the  university.  They  are  not  to  rep- 
resent these  people  as  a  tombstone  might — but  as  living  men  may. 
They  are  to  do  the  things  their  principals  would  assuredly  do 
if  in  their  places  to  enlarge  the  advantage  to  the  cestui  que  trust. 
This  is  a  heavy  burden.  It  must  be  assumed  that  it  is  given  to 
picked  men  who  are  especially  able  to  bear  it;  who  would  not 
give  their  time  to  it  for  mere  money  compensation,  but  are  happy 
in  doing  it  for  the  sake  of  promoting  the  best  and  noblest  things. 

The  trustees  do  not  live  upon  the  campus  and  they  are  not 
assumed  to  be  professional  educationists.  Their  judgment  is  likely 
to  be  quite  as  good  upon  the  relations  of  the  work  to  the  public 
interests  and  as  to  what  the  institution  should  do  to  fulfil  its 
mission  as  that  of  any  expert  would  be.  To  get  done  what  they 
want  done,  they  must  enact  directions  and  appoint  competent  agents. 
The  individual  trustee  has  no  power  of  supervision  or  direction 
not  given  to  him  by  the  recorded  action  of  the  board.  What  they 
do  is  to  be  done  in  session  after  the  modification  of  individual 
opinions  through  joint  discussion.  It  must  be  reduced  to  exact 
form  and  stand  in  a  permanent  record.  Trustees  make  a  mess 
of  it  when  they  usurp  executive  functions  and  they  sow  dragons' 
teeth  when  they  intrigue  with  a  teacher  or  hunt  a  job  for  a  patriot 
who  thinks  he  is  in  need  of  it.  They  are  bound  to  regard  expert 
opinion  and  to  appoint  agents  who  can  render  a  more  expert 
service  than  any  others  who  can  be  procured.  They  are  to  keep 
the  experts  sane,  on  the  earth,  in  touch  with  the  world,  as  it  were. 
They  are  to  sustain  agents  and  help  them  to  succeed,  and  they  are 
to  remove  agents  who  are  not  successful.  From  a  point  of  view 
remote  enough  and  high  enough,  they  are  to  inspect  the  whole 
field.  They  are  bound  to  be  familiar  with  all  that  the  institution 
is  doing.  They  are  to  be  alert  in  keeping  the  whole  organization 
free  from  whatever  may  corrupt,  and  up  to  the  very  top  notch  of 
efficient  public  service.  There  is  too  much  money  involved  to  per- 
mit of  foolishness,  too  high  interests  at  stake  to  allow  of  vacilla- 
tion and  uhcertainty.  Under  a  responsibility  that  is  unceasing 
and  unrelenting  they  must  learn  the  truth  and  never  hesitate  to 
act.  And  they  must  find  their  abundant  reward,  not  in  any 
material  return  to  themselves,  but  in  the  splendid  fact  that  the 


42  NEW    YORK   STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

great  aggregation  of  land  and  structure  and  equipment,  of  great 
teachers  and  aspiring  students,  of  sacred  memories  and  precious 
hope  and  potential  possibilities,  is  doing  the  work  of  God  and 
man  in  the  most  perfect  way  and  in  the  largest  measure  which 
their  knowledge  and  experience,  their  entire  freedom  and  their 
combined  energy  can  devise. 

The  business  of  university  faculties  is  teaching.  It  is  not 
legislation  and  it  is  not  administration, — certainly  not  beyond  the 
absolute  necessities.  There  is  just  complaint  because  the  neces- 
sities of  administration  take  much  time  from  teaching.  It  lessens 
the  most  expert  and  essential  work  which  the  world  is  doing. 
It  seldom  enlarges  opportunity  or  enhances  reputation.  It  is  true 
that  teachers  have  great  fun  legislating  but  it  is  not  quite  certain 
that,  outside  of  their  specialties,  they  will  ever  come  to  conclusions 
or  that,  if  they  do,  their  conclusions  will  stand.  The  main  advant- 
age of  it  is  the  relaxation  and  dissipation  they  get  out  of  it. 
That  is  great.  And,  in  a  way,  it  may  be  as  necessary  as  it  is 
great.  Of  course  teachers  could  not  endure  it  if  they  were  always 
to  conduct  themselves  out  of  the  classroom  as  they  do  in  it. 
Perhaps  others  would  also  have  difficulty  in  enduring  it.  They 
are  given  to  disorderliness  and  argumentation  beyond  any  other 
class  who  stands  so  thoroughly  for  doing  things  in  regular  order.  It  is 
not  strange.  It  is  the  inevitable  reaction,— what  some  of  them  would 
call  the  psychological  antithesis,  I  suppose.  Nor  is  it  to  be  repressed 
or  regretted  for  it  adds  to  the  effectiveness  and  attractiveness  of  the 
most  effective  and  attractive  people  in  the  world.  All  this  is  often 
particularly  true  of  the  past  masters  in  the  art.  No  wonder  that 
Professor  North,  who  taught  Greek  for  sixty  years  at  Hamilton 
College — "  Old  Greek,"  as  many  generations  of  students  fondly 
called  him — wrote  in  his  diary  that  it  would  have  to  be  cut  in 
the  granite  of  his  tombstone  that  he  "  died  of  faculty  meetings," 
for  he  was  sure  that  some  day  he  would  drop  off  before  one  would 
come  to  an  end. 

But  the  needs  of  the  profession  ought  to  be  met  by  directing 
the  surplus  of  physical  and  intellectual  energy  into  really  useful 
and  potential  channels,  such  as  athletics,  or  battling  over  academic 
questions  with  the  doughty  warriors  of  other  universities.  Speak- 
ing seriously,  university  policies  are  not  to  be  settled  by  majority 
vote.  They  are  to  be  determined  by  expert  opinion.  The  very  fact  of 
extreme  expertness  in  one  direction  is  as  likely  as  not  to  imply 
lack  of  it  in  other  directions.  Experts  are  no  more  successful  than 
other  people  in  settling  things  outside  of  their  zone  of  expertness. 
Within  that  they  are  to  have  their  way  so  long  as  they  sustain 


THE    UNIVERSITY    PRESIDENCY  43 

themselves  and  the  money  holds  out.  But  the  resources  are  not  to 
be  equally  divided.  University  rivalries  are  not  to  be  adjusted  by 
treaties  between  the  rivals.  More  of  university  success  depends 
upon  keeping  unimportant  things  from  being  done  in  a  mistaken 
way  than  in  developing  useful  policies  and  pursuing  them  in 
the  correct  way.  Department  experts  are  to  determine  depart- 
ment policies,  college  experts  college  policies,  and  university  ex- 
perts university  policies. 

What  the  President  of  the  United  States  is  to  the  federal  Con- 
gress, the  president  of  the  university  is  to  the  board  of  trustees. 
It  has  not  long  been  so,  because  American  universities  are  recent 
creations.  When  colleges  wer'e  small,  when  the  care  of  their 
property  was  no  task,  when  all  of  a  college  were  of  one  sect 
and  theology  was  the  main  if  not  the  only  purpose,  when  there 
was  but  one  course  of  study  and  the  instruction  was  only  bookish 
and  catechetical — administration  was  no  problem  at  all.  There 
was  nothing  to  put  a  strain  on  the  ship.  Even  though  there  was 
no  specific  responsibility  and  no  delegation  of  special  functions 
with  immediate  accountability,  possessions  did  not  go  to  waste, 
frauds  did  not  creep  in,  and  injustice  and  paralysis  did  not  ensue. 
It  may  easily  be  so  now  in  the  smaller  colleges ;  it  can  not  be 
so  in  the  great  universities.  The  attendance  of  thousands  of 
students,  the  enlargement  of  wealth  and  of  the  number  of  students 
who  go  to  college  without  any  very  definite  aim,  the  admission 
of  women,  the  more  luxurious  and  complex  life,  the  greater  need 
of  just  and  forceful  guidance  of  students,  the  multiplication  of 
departments,  the  substitution  of  the  laboratory  for  the  book,  the 
new  and  numberless  processes,  the  care  of  millions  of  property 
and  the  handling  of  very  large  amounts  of  money,  and  the  con- 
tinual and  complete  meeting  of  all  the  responsibilities  which  this 
great  aggregation  of  materials  and  of  moral  and  industrial  power 
owes  to  the  public,  have  slowly  but  logically  and  as  a  matter  of 
course  developed  the  modern  university  presidency.  It  is  the 
centralized  and  responsible  headship  of  a  balanced  administrative 
organization,  with  specialized  functions  running  out  to  all  of  the 
innumerable  cares  and  activities  of  the  great  institution.  It  is  the 
essential  office  which  holds  the  right  of  leadership,  which  has 
the  responsibility  of  initiative,  which  is  chargeable  with  full  in- 
formation and  held  to  be  endowed  with  sound  discretion,  which 
may  act  decisively  and  immediately  to  conserve  every  interest  and 
promote  every  purpose  for  which  the  university  was  established. 

It  may  be  well  to  specify  and  illustrate.  Conditions  are  not 
whollv  ideal  in  a  university.  Men  and  women  not  altogether  ripe 


44  NEW    YORK   STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

for  translation  have  to  be  dealt  with.  Real  conditions,  often  un- 
precedented,-have  to  be  met.  Not  only  effectiveness  within,  but 
decent  and  helpful  relations  with  neighbors,  constituents  and  the 
world  are  to  be  assured.  Some  authority  must  be  able  to  do 
things  at  once  and  some  word  must  often  be  spoken  to  or  for 
the  university  community.  When  spoken,  it  must  be  a  free  word, 
uttered  out  of  an  ample  right  to  speak. 

An  American  university  may  be  possessed  of  property  worth 
from  three  to  thirty  millions  of  dollars.  This  is  in  lands  and  build- 
ings and  appliances  and  securities.  These  things  may  be  legis- 
lated about,  but  that  is  not  the  care  of  them.  To  keep  them  from 
spoliation  and  make  the  most  of  them  there  must  be  expert  care 
through  a  competent  department  but  in  harmonious  relations  with 
an  ever  present  power  which  has  the  right  and  responsibility  of. 
declaring  and  doing  things. 

The  very  life  of  the  institution  depends  upon  eliminating  weak 
and  unproductive  teachers  and  upon  reinforcing  the  teaching  body 
with  the  very  best  in  the  world.  Unless  there  is  scientific  aggres- 
siveness in  the  search  of  new  knowledge  some  very  serious  claims 
must  be  abandoned  and  some  attitudes  completely  changed.  No 
board  ever  got  rid  of  a  teacher  or  an  investigator — no  matter  how 
weak  or  absurd — except  for  immorality  known  to  the  public.  The 
reason  why  a  board  can  not  deal  with  such  a  matter  is  the  lack 
of  individual  confidence  about  what  to  do  and  of  individual  re- 
sponsibility for  doing  nothing.  But.  with  three  or  four  hundred 
in  the  faculty,  the  need  of  attention  to  this  vital  matter  is  always 
present.  No  board  knows  where  new  men  of  first  quality  are 
to  be  found :  no  board  can  conduct  the  negotiations  for  them  or 
fit  them  into  an  harmonious  and  effective  whole.  The  man  who 
is  fitted  for  this  great  burden  and  who  puts  his  conscience  up 
against  his  responsibility  can  hardly  be  expected  to  tolerate  the 
opposition  of  an  unsubstantial  sentiment  which  would  protect  a 
teacher  at  all  hazards,  or  the  more  subtle  combination  of  selfish 
influences  which  puts  personal  over  and  above  public  interests 
when  the  upbuilding  of  a  university  is  the  task  in  hand. 

Not  only  must  the  teaching  staff  be  developed, — the  work  must 
be  organized.  It  must  develop  a  following,  connect  with  the  cir- 
cumstances and  purposes  of  a  constituency,  and  lead  as  well  as 
it  can  up  to  the  peaks  of  knowledge.  It  is  not  necessary  that  all 
universities  cover  the  same  lines  of  work  or  have  the  same 
standards.  It  is  not  imperative  that  all  have  the  same  courses  or 
courses  of  the  same  length.  It  is  necessary  that  all  serve  and 
uplift  their  people.  But  how?  A  master  of  literature  will  say 


THE    UNIVERSITY    PRESIDENCY  45 

through  classical  training  and  literary  style;  a  scientist  will  say 
through  laboratories;  a  political  economist  will  say  through  his- 
tory and  figures  and  logic;  an  engineer  will  say  through  roads 
and  bridges  and  knowledge  of  materials,  and  the  generation  and 
transmission  of  power,  and  skill  at  construction ;  and  a  professional 
man  will  say  through  building  up  professional  schools,  providing 
no  mistake  be  made  about  the  particular  kind  of  school.  Some 
one  of  wide  experience,  having  a  scholar's  training  and  sympathies, 
possessed  of  a  judicial  temperament  and  with  decisiveness  as  well, 
must  have  the  responsibility  and  the  initiative  of  distributing  re- 
sources justly  as  between  the  multifarious  interests  and  binding 
them  all  into  an  harmonious  and  effective  whole.  Difficult  as  that 
is,  it  is  not  the  heaviest  burden  of  university  leadership.  Ideals 
must  be  upheld  and  made  attractive:  they  must  be  sane  ideals 
which  appeal  to  real  men, — and  not  only  to  old  men,  but  to  young 
men.  There  must  be  no  mistaking  of  dyspepsia  for  principle,  no 
assumption  that  character  grows  only  when  powers  fail ;  but  a 
rational  philosophy  of  life  by  which  men  may  live  as  well  as 
die.  Nor  is  this  all.  There  must  be  forehandedness.  Someone 
must  be  charged  with  the  responsibility  of  peering  into  the  future 
and  leading  forward.  New  and  yet  more  difficult  roads  must  be 
broken  out.  Someone  in  position  to  do  it  must  be  active  in 
initiating  things.  He  must  see  what  will  go — and,  quite  as  clearly, 
what  will  not  go.  Subtle  but  fallacious  logic — and  a  vast  deal  of  it — 
must  be  resisted,  greed  combated,  conceits  punctured,  resources 
augmented,  influences  enlarged,  forces  marshaled  for  practical 
undertakings,  and  the  whole  enterprise  made  to  give  a  steadily 
increasing  service  to  the  industrial,  professional,  political  and  moral 
interests  of  a  whole  people. 

Then  there  is  the  management  and  guidance  of  students.  One 
may  as  well  complain  because  this  country  is  a  democracy  as 
to  repine  because  the  sons  and  daughters  of  the  masses  want  to 
go  to  college.  There  is  no  ground  for  regret  in  the  fact  that 
our  universities  are  not  just  like  some  universities  over  the  seas. 
We  have  much  to  learn  from  them  and  we  are  likely  to  learn 
much.  We  have  quite  as  much  to  avoid.  It  seems  too  much  to 
expect  to  work  un-American  ideas,  and  perhaps  loose  habits,  out 
of  American  students  who  study  in  Europe,  when  they  come  home. 
We  are  different  from  them  because  of  our  circumstances  and 
political  history,  because  of  our  spirit  and  outlook.  That  is  reason 
enough  why  our  universities  are  different  from  theirs. 

It  is  useless  to  question  whether  all  who  come  to  the  higher 
educational  institutions  are  wise  in  coming.  They  are  coming1. 


46  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

The  work  will  have  to  be  broad  enough  to  meet  their  needs.  Nor 
is  it  worth  while  to  bewail  the  fact  that  all  who  come  are  not 
serious  students.  Their  purposes  are  good  enough  and  serious 
enough  according  to  their  lights.  Their  preparation  is  what  has 
been  exacted  by  the  university  and  provided  by  the  high  school. 
Some  of  them  have  to  be  pulled  up  and  pushed  along  but  the 
process  often  brings  out  most  unexpected  results.  Students  are  not 
all  angels,  but  every  student  is  worth  being  helped  by  an  angel  up 
to  an  angel's  place.  The  task  is  upon  the  people  who  undertake 
to  manage  universities.  Students  have  to  be  directed  in  companies 
but  dealt  with  individually.  They  may  be  directed  by  a  rule :  when 
they  break  the  rule  they  must  be  dealt  with  by  a  man.  It  must 
be  a  man  who  can  stand  pat  for  all  that  ought  to  inhere  in  a 
university;  but  such  a  man  will  get  on  best  if  in  addition 
to  being  able  to  stand  pat  he  is  able  to  like  boys ;  he  is  likely 
to' get  on  still  better  if  he  was  once  a  rather  lively  boy  himself; 
or,  at  least,  if  he  is  a  kind  of  man  for  whom  a  boy  with  some 
ginger  in  him  can  find  it  in  his  heart  to  have  not  only  considerable 
respect  but  some  regard  and  admiration. 

This  is  not  saying  that  college  students  are  to  be  treated  like 
children.  It  is  not  implied  that  they  are  to  be  excused  for  being 
ruffians.  Quite  the  contrary  is  true.  They  are  to  be  held  exactly 
responsible  to  law  and  rule  and  all  well  known  standards  of  decent 
living.  There  must  be  less  viciousness  in  the  life  of  American 
universities  or  they  must  and  ought  to  suffer  seriously  for  it.  It 
is  to  be  resented  and  punished  far  more  forcefully  than  it  has 
been.  Students  who  get  into  this  kind  of  thing  and  persist  in 
staying  in  are  to  be  punished,  even  to  the  point  of  being  thrust 
out — and  even  though  it  changes  the  course  of  their  lives  and 
breaks  the  hearts  of  fathers  and  mothers.  The  good  of  all  is  the 
overwhelming  consideration.  A  university  is  to  be  a  university 
and  not  something  else.  Of  all  institutions  it  is  to  stand  for  char- 
acter and  ideals.  The  universities  are  not  to  be  closed  and  all 
youth  denied  their  advantages  because  a  few  abuse  their  privileges. 
The  punishment  of  the  bad,  if  there  are  any  bad,  is  the  protec- 
tion of  all  the  rest.  It  is  an  essential  safeguard  to  safe  adminis- 
tration and  the  wholesome  living  of  the  crowd.  But  is  it  not  better 
to  hold  all  the  boys  we  can  from  going  to  the  dogs  by  keeping 
in  sympathy  and  touch  with  them,  than  it  is  to  encourage  them 
into  deviltry  through  the  coldness  or  the  downright  dulness  or 
nervelessness  or  cowardliness  of  an  administration? 

The  logic  of  the  situation  puts  this  burden  upon  the  president, 
or  upon  one  working:  with  singleness  of  purpose  with  him.  Likely 


THE    UNIVERSITY    PRESIDENCY  47 

the  president  can  not  deal  with  all  directly,  but  that  is  no  reason 
why  he  should  not  go  as  far  as  he  may.  He  must  assume  responsi- 
bility for  management,  giving  the  right  turn  and  inspiration  to  it. 
It  is  essentially  an  executive  function.  The  sun  may  well  avail 
himself  of  the  assistance  of  a  cloud  to  save  his  face  when  a  board 
of  trustees  begins  to  make  preachments  filled  with  benevolent 
advice  to  a  body  of  students ;  and  even  the  man  in  the  moon  may 
be  excused  if  he  shuts  one  eye  in  contemplation,  at  the  spectacle 
of  a  university  senate  undertaking  to  deal  with  a  college  boy  in  a 
scrape. 

So  much  in  reference  to  routine.  The  president  who  only  fol- 
lows routine  of  course  falls  short.  He  is  to  construct  as  well  as 
administer.  He  must  initiate  measures  which  will  result  in  larger 
facilities,  in  added  offerings  and  enterprises,  in  searching  out  new 
knowledge,  in  the  wider  application  of  principles  to  work,  and 
not  only  in  the  usual  but  in  the  better  training  of  men  and  women 
for  distinct  usefulness  in  life.  He  is  not  only  to  see  that  plans 
are  within  the  limits  of  revenues,  that  the  physical  condition  of  the 
plant  improves,  that  everything  is  clean  and  attractive,  that  the 
faculty  is  scientifically  productive,  that  the  instruction  is  exact 
and  the  spirit  true;  but  he  is  to  take  the  steps  which  will  keep 
the  whole  organization  moving  ahead.  He  must  adopt  and  pro- 
mote and  give  full  credit  for  movements  initiated  by  others  when 
their  propositions  are  safe  and  practicable, — but  he  must  also  be 
alert  in  stopping  movements  which  will  not  go. 

Perhaps  more  important  than  all,  the  president  is  to  declare  from 
time  to  time  the  best  university  opinion  concerning  popular  move- 
ments and  the  serious  interests  of  the  state.  He  must  connect 
the  university  with  the  life  of  the  multitude  and  exert  its  in- 
fluence for  the  quickening  and  guidance  of  that  public  opinion 
which,  as  Talleyrand  said,  is  more  powerful  than  all  the  monarchs 
who  ever  lived  or  all  the  laws  which  were  ever  declared. 

The  unity  and  security  of  a  university  can  only  be  assured  through 
accountability  to  a  central  office.  While  every  one  is  to  have  free- 
dom to  do  in  his  own  way  the  thing  he  is  set  to  do,  so  long 
as  his  way  proves  to  be  a  good  way,  the  harmony  of  the  whole 
depends  upon  the  parts  fitting  together  and  upon  definiteness  •  of 
responsibility  and  frequency  of  accountability.  No  self-respecting 
man  is  going  to  administer  a  great  office,  or  an  office  responsible 
for  great  results,  and  have  any  doubts  about  possessing  the  powers 
necessary  or  incident  to  the  performance  of  his  work.  He  will 
have  enough  to  think  of  without  having  any  doubt  upon  that  sub- 
ject. There  need  be  no  fear  of  his  being  too  much  inflated  with, 


48  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

power.  There  will  be  enough  to  take  the  conceits  out  of  him  and 
keep  him  upon  the  earth.  If  he  can  not  exercise  the  powers  of 
his  great  office  and  yet  keep  steady  and  sane  there  is  no  hope 
for  him  and  he  will  speedily  come  to  official  ruin.  It  is  not  a 
matter  of  uplifting  or  of  inflating  a  man,  but  of  getting  a  man  who 
can  meet  the  demands  of  a  great  situation. 

Of  course,  no  one  can  realize  the  hopes  which  center  in  a  uni- 
versity presidency  without  being  able  to  work  harmoniously  with 
others.  There  must  be  true  deference  to  the  opinions  of  many  and 
scrupulous  recognition  of  the  just,  though  unexpressed,  claims  of 
all.  But  he  must  never  forget  that  administrative  freedom  is  quite 
as  inviolable  as  any  other  freedom,  even  in  a  university.  He  must 
mark  out  his  official  course  for  himself  and  bear  the  responsibility 
of  it  without  cavil.  He  must  expect  to  suffer  criticism  and  oppo- 
sition, even  contumely.  He  can  not  expect  that  the  work  he  has 
to  do  will  make  every  one  happy.  It  will  discomfit  many.  In 
one  way  or  another  they  will  give  him  all  the  trouble  they  can. 
The  protests  will  be  the  loudest  because  of  the  very  acts  for 
which  his  office  has  been  developed.  But  he  may  comfort  him- 
self with  the  reflection  that  if  the  job  were  not  so  heavy  they 
would  have  a  cheaper  man  to  do  it,  and  that  the  extent  of  the 
opposition  is  often  the  measure  of  real  presidential  business  that 
is  being  performed.  In  any  event,  his  only  hope  is  in  success, 
and  he  can  not  go  around  the  duty  which  confronts  him  without 
inevitable  failure.  Conditions  may  easily  make  a  mere  compro- 
miser of  him.  If  they  do,  the  waves  will  speedily  close  over  his 
official  remains  forever.  Some  choice  and  magnanimous  spirits 
will  help  him ;  but  he  need  entertain  no  doubt  that  there  will  be 
plenty  more  on  every  side  to  try  out  the  stuff  that  is  in  him, 
and  that  they  will  diligently  attend  to  the  trying  out  process  until 
enough  occurs  to  convince  them  that  his  wisdom,  his  rational 
conception  of  his  task,  his  love  of  justice  and  sense  of  humor, 
his  constructive  planning,  his  independence,  and  his  fearlessness, 
are  sufficient  to  prove  him  worthy  of  as  great  an  opportunity  for 
usefulness  and  honor  as  ever  comes  to  any  man. 

All  this  calls  for  a  rare  man.  He  ought,  in  the  first  place, 
to  be  reasonably  at  peace  with  mankind  and  in  love  with  youth. 
He  must  have  the  gift  of  organizing  and  the  qualities  of  leadership. 
He  ought  to  have  been  trained  in  the  universities,  not  only  for 
the  sake  of  his  own  scholarship,  but  that  he  may  be  wholly  at 
home  in  their  routine  and  imbued  with  their  purposes.  He  must 
be  moved  by  public  spirit  as  distinguished  from  university  routine 
or  mere  scholarly  purpose.  He  must  be  a  scholar — but  not  neces- 


THE    UNIVERSITY    PRESIDENCY  49 

sarily  in  literature  or  science  or  moral  philosophy.  It  is  quite 
as  well  if  it  is  in  law,  or  engineering,  or  political  history.  He 
must  be  sympathetic  with  all  learning.  He  can  no  longer  hope 
to  be  a  scholar  in  every  study.  He  can  hardly  hope  to  administer 
such  a  trust  or  fill  such  a  post  without  some  knowledge  of  and 
considerable  aptitude  for  law.  His  sense  of  justice  must  be  keen, 
his  power  of  discrimination  quick,  his  judgment  of  men  and  women 
accurate;  his  patience  and  politeness  must  give  no  sign  of  tiring, 
and  the  strength  of  his  purpose  to  accomplish  what  needs  to  be 
done  must  endure  to  the  very  end.  Yet  he  must  determine  dif- 
ferences and  decide  things.  He  must  have  the  power  of  expression 
as  well  as  the  more  substantial  attainments.  Beyond  possessing 
sense,  training,  outlook,  experience,  resistive  power,  decisiveness, 
and  aggressiveness,  he  ought  to  be  a  forceful  and  graceful  writer 
and  at  least  an  acceptable  public  speaker.  In  a  word — the  presi- 
dent of  an  American  university  is  bound  to  be  not  only  one  of 
the  most  profound  scholars  but  quite  as  much  one  of  the  very 
great,  all  round  men  of  his  generation. 


ADDRESS  AT  THE  INAUGURAL  EXERCISES  OF  PRESI- 
DENT JAMES  AT  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 

Mr  Chairman  and  Men  and  Women  of  the  University  of  Illinois: 
The  distinguished  presence,  the  impressive  procedure,  and  the 
function  and  purpose  of  this  great  university  convocation  are 
surely  sufficient  to  make  it  memorable.  Other  gatherings  for  the 
discussion  of  many  subjects  of  the  highest  import  to  higher  edu- 
cation in  America  have  been  associated  with  this  assemblage.  The 
effort  to  accompany  an  installation  with  an  educational  advance 
has  been  evident.  The  gracious  attendance  of  the  representatives 
of  many  American  and  of  some  foreign  universities  lends  very  sub- 
stantial assistance  to  this  effort.  Taken  together,  the  exercises  may 
rival  if  not  surpass  any  previous  undertaking  in  the  interests 
of  the  higher  learning  in  the  Mississippi  valley. 

Of  very  considerable  interest  to  all,  the  occasion  is  certainly 
of  profound  significance  to  this  university.  We  are  now  at  the 
heart  of  the  business  for  which  we  invited  so  many.  We  are 
taking  a  step  of  the  very  first  magnitude  in  our  affairs.  We 
are  conferring  a  very  great  honor.  We  are  imposing  a  very  great 
burden.  It  is  through  the  bestowal  of  a  very  great  office.  We 
are  come  not  merely  to  ratify  an  appointment  or  to  deliver  keys 
but  to  give  a  new  leader  the  expression  of  our  confidence  and 
the  assurance  of  our  help.  We  would  not  disguise  our  understand- 
ing of  what  it  all  implies  to  him,  to  us,  and  to  all  of  the  interests 
of  this  institution.  We  would  invest  this  occasion  with  all  serious- 
ness. With  solemnity  we  pledge  our  support.  Realizing  both  the 
need  and  the  meaning  of  it,  we  offer  words  of  cheer  and  the 
best  wishes  which  a  buoyant  and  expectant  people  can  lay  at  the 
feet  of  a  new  administration. 

This  is  not  the  day  for  reminiscence,  but  it  is  the  day  for  reflec- 
tion, as  well  as  the  day  of  hope.  Rational  outlook  rests  upon  a 
true  understanding  of  what  is  and  what  has  been.  In  university 
building  the  future  can  lift  high  its  turrets  only  upon  foundations 
laid  sure  and  true.  There  is  no  better  exemplification  of  American 
spirit  anywhere  than  is  found  in  the  history  of  this  university. 
Without  any  aid  from  nature  but  a  rich  soil,  without  a  single 
helpful  feature  in  the  landscape,  upon  almost  an  exact  plain,  with- 
out hill  or  tree  or  rock  or  river,  it  has  made  a  campus  as  home- 
like and  ennobling  as  any  one  of  us  has  seen.  Without  building 
materials  in  the  neighborhood,  it  has  erected  buildings  at  once 


ADDRESS    AT   THE    INAUGURAL   EXERCISES    OF    PRESIDENT    JAMES      $1 

spacious  and  serviceable.  With  a  school  of  architecture  of  its 
own,  without  close  association  with  the  best  architecture  of  the 
world,  with  considerable  of  the  feeling  that  a  new  building  belonged 
to  an  architect  who  had  been  trained  by  the  university,  and  that 
in  time  every  graduate  in  architecture  ought  to  be  represented 
by  a  building,  it  has,  in  one  way  or  another,  which  need  not  be 
specified  here,  worked  out  or  worried  out  a  very  respectable  col- 
lection of  architectural  effects.  Located  between  and  across  the 
border  line  of  two  small  cities,  it  has  risen  above  their  rivalries, 
made  them  useful  suburbs,  and  given  them  a  happy  mission — 
even  the  housing  of  the  people  of  a  university.  Started  in  an 
environment  not  specially  conducive  to  scholarly  pursuits,  it  has 
developed  a  setting  which  is  beginning  to  support  its  work  admir- 
ably. Far  from  the  geographical  or  popular  center  of  the  state, 
it  has  overcome  distances  and  become  a  conspicuous  spot  on  the 
map  of  Illinois.  Without  a  large  city  to  draw  upon  for  students, 
even  beset  with  deep  prejudices  and  sharp  rivalries,  it  has  filled 
all  the  highways  with  happy  young  men  and  maidens,  coming  to 
or  going  from  its  work.  At  a  distance  from  large  libraries  and 
without  free  association  with  the  centers  of  scholarship,  and  until 
now  with  very  inadequate  support,  it  has  built  up  an  instructional 
force  exceptionally  able  at  many  points  and  of  very  satisfactory 
average  strength.  Under  the  disadvantages  as  well  as  the  advan- 
tages of  a  popular  support  and  a  democratic  management  it  has 
become  widely  celebrated  for  its  unparalleled  growth,  and  has 
fought  its  way  to  a  very  high  place  in  the  list  of  large  American 
universities.  One  hundred  out  of  the  one  hundred  and  two  coun- 
ties of  Illinois,  forty-three  other  states,  and  eight  foreign  countries 
are  represented  in  its  student  body.  In  the  breadth  of  its  offer- 
ings and  the  measure  and  the  loftiness  of  its  ambitions  it  is  second 
to  none.  When  it  was  robbed  of  most  of  its  invested  and  much 
of  its  operating  funds,  it  succeeded  in  three  weeks — with  the  help 
of  the  Legislature  and  Governor — in  converting  its  discomfiture 
into  better  securities  than  universities  ordinarily  have, — good,  five 
per  cent  everlasting  bonds  of  the  commonwealth  of  Illinois.  Later 
than  all  neighboring  state  universities  in  getting  started,  and  ex« 
ceedingly  slow  in  gaining  moneyed  support,  it  has  at  last  won  the 
genuine  pride  and  generous  confidence  of  a  state  which  can  do 
whatever  it  will — for  which  all  of  us  make  most  sincere  acknowl- 
edgments in  the  hope  of  yet  larger  favors  still  to  come.  Drawing 
upon  other  universities  and  all  other  sources  of  supply  for  all 
it  can  get.  it  is  increasing  its  contributions  to  the  scholarship  of 
the  country  and  doing  more  than  was  ever  foreseen  to  train  the 


52  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

young  men  and  women  of  a  rich  and  imperial  state  to  the  serious 
business  of  making  the  most  of  themselves  through  intelligent  and 
tiring  work  of  every  kind  and  through  a  rational  use  of  the  results 
of  commercial  and  industrial  prosperity. 

This  state  is  fortunate  in  that  its  state  university  and  its  agri- 
cultural and  mechanical  colleges  are  .being  developed  together. 
The  work  of  each  supports  the  other.  It  is  producing  a  very  large 
institution,  one  with  broad  foundations  and  innumerable  offerings. 
With  all  of  the  departments  here  where  there  is  small  need  of 
physicians,  its  medical  colleges  are  where  medical  men  are  most 
in  demand  and  at  the  largest  center  of  medical  education  in  the 
world.  All  in  all,  it  is  accumulating  students  with  a  rapidity  which 
is  creating  a  responsibility  beyond  compute. 

We  all  know  this,  but  it  is  well  to  express  it.  It  gives  us 
strength.  We  are  equal  to  it.  By  common  assent  and  intuitive 
impulse  this  institution  is  now  to  be  made  great  as  well  as  big. 
The  state  university  development  in  America  is  one  of  the  very 
greatest  as  well  as  the"  most  surprising  movements  in  world  edu- 
cation. It  is  the  logical  outgrowth  of  the  democratic  advance. 
Few  will  say  that  the  state  universities  are  not  already  as  potential 
as  the  universities  which  have  preceded  them.  In  opportunities  to 
serve  a  people  through  the  applications  of  learning  to  diversified 
life,  as  well  as  in  the  aspiration  and  the  strength  to  make  that  service 
great,  they  are  ranking  university  operations  everywhere.  Illinois 
expects  to  lag  behind  no  other  state  in  the  generosity  and  the 
intelligence  of  her  doing  for  the  higher  learning.  She  provides 
the  means  and  calls  the  best  men  she  can  get  fo*-  her  service.  Then 
she  wants  a  new  advance.  She  will  not  temporize  with  oppor- 
tunity. She  will  not  tolerate  excuses.  She  will  go  forward.  With 
profound  regard  for  all  the  states  around  her,  with  the  warmest 
appreciation  of  the  aid  she  is  getting  from  other  universities,  and 
the  most  unqualified  assurances  of  reciprocity,  the  keynote  of  this 
great  week  at  the  University  of  Illinois  sounds  a  decided  advance 
to  higher  and  stronger  ground. 

One  who  has  the  gifts  and  the  strength  to  lead  this  advance 
is  to  be  envied  the  opportunity.  I  wish  I  could  compound  the 
thinking  and  express  the  reflections  and  the  hopefulness  of  us 
all.  The  suggestions,  born  of  my  thinking  and  my  experience, 
which  bear  upon  this  hour  and  the  future  of  this  university,  are 
in  these  plain  and  fundamental,  briefly  stated  propositions: 

Serve  the  commonwealth  of  Illinois,  not  only  in  her  industries, 
but  in  her  political  theories  and  practices,  in  rearing  noble  ideals 
of  true  culture,  and  in  strengthening  her  conception  of  the  moral 


ADDRESS    AT   THE    INAUGURAL   EXERCISES    OF    PRESIDENT  JAMES      53 

obligations  of  such  a  people.  Do  it  when  sure  of  your  ground,  even 
though  it  compels  the  saying  of  some  things  which,  at  the  moment, 
many  of  her  people  may  not  like  to  hear. 

Aid  every  educational  activity,  whether  public  school  or  parish 
school  or  proprietary  school,  whether  endowed  college  or  profes- 
sional school,  or  private  or  public  library,  or  study  club,  or  what- 
ever else  it  may  be,  if  it  has  the  purpose  of  enlarging  knowledge 
or  extending  culture  in  or  out  of  the  schools.  Be  true  to  every 
other  university.  Never  forget  that  meanness  defeats  itself.  In. 
education  the  way  to  get  rich  is  through  enriching  others. 

Bring  to  this  university  the  best  scholars  who  can  be  procured" 
in  any  part  of  the  world.  There  are  no  artificial  barriers  and  no 
political  boundaries  in  the  democracy  of  learning.  Pay  what  you 
have  to  pay  in  order  to  have  the  best  instruction  in  the  country. 
That  is  one  of  the  leading  things  for  which  the  last  administration 
was  disposed  to  give  way  to  the  new  one.  The  old  one  could  have 
gone  on  in  the  old  way.  It  was  believed  that  a  new  leader  could 
take  some  important  steps  more  surely  than  the  old  one.  If  not 
taken,  an  opportunity  will  be  lost.  He  is  here  to  fill  the  gap  of 
opportunity  to  the  full.  Let  the  fact  be  established  and  let  the 
country  come  to  know  that  no  more  new  truth  is  likely  to  be 
dug  out  anywhere,  and  no  better  instruction  provided  anywhere, 
than  at  the  University  of  Illinois. 

Develop  young  men  in  the  faculties  by  giving  them  their  oppor- 
tunities ;  and  assure  them  just  credit  for  all  the  work  they  do.  Do 
not  stunt  them  by  letting  them  think  that  they  are  so  very  much 
larger  than  they  really  are. 

Enter  into  student  sympathies  and  share  student  outlook.  Brace 
up  the  timid  and  the  hesitating.  Find  ways  to  put  surplus  energies 
to  useful  ends.  Give  all  plenty  of  good  work  to  do.  Forgive  the 
ones  who  are  a  trifle  too  active  but  not  so  very  bad.  Let  the 
vicious  know  that  there  is  no  place  for  viciousness  in  the  affairs 
of  a  university.  Command  the  situation  through  the  stirring  of 
sentiment,  through  the  development  of  opinion,  and  through  re- 
liance upon  that  moral  sense  which  in  the  last  analysis  is  always 
overwhelming  in  a  university  crowd. 

Let  justice  and  sense  stand,  whoever  falls.  Let  there  be  a  day 
in  court  for  all.  Be  as  just  to  a  student  when  a  teacher  is  at  fault 
as  to  a  teacher  when  a  student  is  in  trouble. 

Fight  for  absolute  cleanness.  Insist  that  everything  shall  com- 
port with  the  purposes  of  such  an  institution.  Demand  that  every 
one  in  the  service  shall  have  undivided  devotion  to  the  work  which 
he  undertakes.  Avoid  expenditures  which  do  not  commend  them- 


$4  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

selves  to  the  good  sense  of  sane  and  experienced  men.  Reject  all 
extravagancies.  When  money  is  expended  see  that  a  dollar  buys 
the  value  of  a  dollar.  Stand  for  nothing  until  convinced;  shrink 
from  nothing  merely  because  some  one  may  be  discomfited. 

Mr  President,  administer  your  splendid  estate,  and  execute  the 
high  purpose  for  which  this  great  aggregation  of  material  things 
and  of  intellectual  and  moral  forces  is  maintained.  Do  it  without 
fear  or  favor,  without  thinking  much  of  the  hazards  or  of  the 
compensations,  and  the  people  of  the  commonwealth  of  Illinois, 
and  the  Almighty  God,  will  take  care  of  you. 

The  real  growth  and  strength  of  this  university  have  hardly 
appeared.  The  future  will  overshadow  the  past.  Hearts,  minds, 
money,  boundless  energy,  the  public  interests  and  the  common 
pride  are  all  enlisted  to  carry  the  University  of  Illinois  to  a  place 
of  the  very  first  significance  in  American  education.  All  that  is 
wanted  is  a  scholarly,  a  sane,  and  a  fearless  leadership.  If  one 
-can  not  supply  it,  another  will.  With  one  accord  we  think  we  have 
"found  the  man  who  can. 

I  am  transferring  to  him  not  only  a  title  but  an  opportunity; 

Tiot  only  an  office  but  my  hope  and  my  confidence  that  he  may 

^enlarge  it.    I  did  not  impair  this  office :  it  is  a  greater  office  than  it 

"used  to  be.     It  is  as  precious  a  thing  as  I  shall  ever  have  to  give. 

Before  I  could  transfer  it  with  cheerfulness  and  with  confidence 

I  have  been  obliged  to  think  more  deeply  than  have  many  others 

of  the  needs  of  the  situation  here  and  in  another   state,  and  of 

the  adaptation  of  men  to  differing  work.     My  attachments  are  no 

stronger   there  than   here.     The   decision   came   out   of   a   mental 

process  which  has  tried  out  feeling  and  broken  some  strings.     The 

new  president  has  been  an  all-important  factor  in  the  case.     But 

I  am  ready.    The  attributes  of  the  new  leader  give  me  confidence 

and  the  universal  acclaim  makes  me  know  that  all  is  well. 

A  true  son  of  Illinois ;  with  the  fine  lineage  of  her  best  pioneers ; 
with  native  pride  in  her  history;  with  scholarly  appreciation  of 
her  resources  and  of  her  intellectual  development;  with  a  mature 
and  balanced  understanding  of  her  needs,  as  well  as  with  patriotic 
enthusiasm  for  all  that  may  uplift  her ;  a  severe  student,  trained 
in  the  best  schools  of  the  world;  a  virile  teacher;  a  publicist  of 
wide  reputation ;  an  experienced  and  trenchant  administrator ;  we 
envy  him  the  gifts  and  the  opportunity  which  will  let  him  impress 
lives,  shape  ends,  weave  his  name  into  the  history  of  this  university, 
and  add  to  the  greatness  of  his  state;  and  we  give  him  all  the 
cheer  that  can  spring  out  of  song,  with  all  the  sincerity  that  can 
breathe  through  prayer. 


REMARKS  AT  SOUTHERN  EDUCATIONAL  CONFER- 
ENCE, COLUMBIA,  S.  C. 

Reprinted  from  the  published  proceedings 

Mr  President,  and  You  My  Friends  of  the  Southern  Educa- 
tional Conference:  I  am  sure  I  should  have  been  very  glad  indeed 
if  my  name  could  have  been  omitted  from  the  list  of  speakers, 
because  of  the  lateness  of  the  hour  and  particularly  because  we  are 
all  waiting  to  hear  the  concluding  speech,  by  His  Excellency,  the 
Governor. 

But  as  the  way  is  open,  I  am  glad  to  express  the  pleasure  I 
have  found  in  my  visit  to  Columbia  and  in  the  proceedings  of  the 
conference.  It  is  my  first  visit  to  Columbia  and  my  first  attendance 
upon  the  conference.  I  am  bound  to  tell  you  that  I  came  with 
high  expectations.  I  have  experienced  southern  hospitality  before 
and  I  knew  that  we  would  be  graciously  entertained.  I  knew  you 
would  not  invite  us  here  unless  you  were  anxious  to  follow  your 
invitation  with  a  sincere  and  genuine  welcome.  For  the  last  ten 
years  I  have  been  associated  with  one  of  the  great  state  univer- 
sities, and  that  has  led  me  to  know  something  more  than  I  other- 
wise might  about  the  State  College  of  South  Carolina,  located 
here.  I  knew  that  that  institution,  with  other  educational  activities 
of  the  city,  must  have  cooperated  with  the  prevailing  conditions 
to  develop  a  society  of  rich  and  unusual  culture  at  the  South 
Carolina  capital.  Yet,  Mr  President,  I  am  bound  to  say  that 
some  of  us  surely,  and  perhaps  all  of  us,  have  had  some  object 
lessons  in  generous  hospitality  and  magnificent  kindliness  which 
exceeded  our  expectations  and  which  have  made  us  fast  friend* 
for  life.  [Applause] 

I  have  heard  a  great  deal  said  from  this  platform  about 
"  problems."  All  earnest  people  have  problems.  I  do  not  want 
you  to  think  you  have  a  monopoly  of  them  in  the  South.  In  the 
great  metropolis  of  the  Union  there  are  educational  problems 
quite  as  serious  as  any  in  the  Southern  States.  I  suppose  that 
in  the  heart  of  the  city  of  New  York  there  are  three  quarters 
of  a  million  of  people  who  know  little  or  nothing  of  democratic 
government  or  of  American  institutions.  They  hardly  know  th#- 
English  language  at  all.  They  are  as  yet  foreign  to  our  life  and 
our  outlook.  They  are  to  be  absorbed  into  our  citizenship.  Their 


56  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

children,  and  they  have  lots  of  them,  are  to  be  trained  in  our 
schools.  And  those  very  people  have  a  considerable  part  in  estab- 
lishing and  managing  the  schools  which  are  to  do  that  work.  If 
educational  problems  made  people  poor,  I  suspect  that  each  of  us 
•would  be  as  poor  as  any  two  of  you  put  together.  [Laughter] 

We  who  have  been  together  in  this  conference  understand  each 
other  pretty  well.  We  all  have  some  form  of  citizenship  in  the 
democracy  of  learning.  We  know  something  of  the  fundamental 
principles  of  that  institution1.  We  have  come  down  from  the 
North  not  to  parade  our  intellectual  estate  or  to  patronize  you, 
but  to  learn  something  and  if  possible  to  give  you  a  word  of  cheer 
and  enrich  ourselves  by  the  giving.  In  the  democracy  of  learn- 
ing, the  only  way  to  get  gain  is  to  give  away  as  much  as  one 
can.  [Laughter  and  applause]  About  the  only  way  one  can  get 
much  in  such  work  as  this  is  by  lifting  all  the  rest  as  much  as 
he  can.  In  the  democracy  of  learning  there  are  no  political, 
sectarian,  state  or  sectional  lines.  We  all  mingle  together  to  put 
in  our  experiences  and  our  thinking  and  to  take  out  of  the  common 
accumulations  whatever  we  most  need.  Before  the  good-fellow- 
ship, the  generosity,  the  energy,  and  the  enthusiasm  generated  in 
these  conferences,  difficulties  give  way  •  and  the  mountains  shrink 
into  mole  hills.  [Applause] 

Educational  work  in  America  is  unique.  This  is  the  land  of 
opportunity.  It  is  the  national  policy  that  every  man  and  woman, 
every  boy  and  girl,  shall  have  a  right  to  an  education  suitable 
to  his  situation.  Every  one  is  to  have  a  chance  to  lift  himself 
above  the  situation  in  which  he  was  born.  Even  more, — it  is  the 
national  belief  that  it  is  a  sound  national  policy  to  aid  and  encourage 
every  one  to  make  the  most  of  himself.  The  more  we  can  make 
of  each  one  of  the  individual  units  in  our  citizenship  the  greater 
and  stronger  does  the  nation  become.  All  the  nations  do  not 
accept  that.  In  some  lands  statesmen  are  afraid  of  it.  But  we 
"believe  in  it.  It  is  the  plan  of  the  North  and  it  is  the  plan  of 
the  South.  The  same  thing  that  brings  us  into  common  fellowship 
and  stirs  our  common  sympathies  in  our  educational  conferences 
distinguishes  the  American  nation  in  the  world.  [Applause] 

I  have  been  especially  interested  in  the  reports  made  to  the 
conference  by  the  different  state  superintendents  of  schools  from 
nearly  all  of  the  Southern  States.  I  was  prepared  for  a  good 
^howing  for  it  recently  devolved  upon  me  to  review,  for  publica- 
tion, the  educational  legislation  of  the  last  year  in  all  of  the  states, 
and  from  that  examination  I  knew  that  there  was  an  educational 
revival  sweeping  across  the  Southland  [applause],  but  the  definite 


REMARKS    AT    SOUTHERN    EDUCATIONAL    CONFERENCE  57 

reports  of  new  buildings,  more  teachers,  enlarged  salaries,  im- 
proved preparation  of  teachers,  and  all  of  the  accessories  of  a 
better  school  system  are  most  gratifying.  And  let  me  say  that 
nothing  in  this  conference  has  stirred  my  admiration  more  than 
the  able  and  heroic  treatment  of  the  matter  of  school  attendance 
and  of  the  illiteracy  consequent  upon  nonattendance,  presented 
to  us  by  Superintendent  W.  H.  Hand  of  Chester  in  this  state. 
[Applause]  One  must  face  the  real  facts  when  he  would  accom- 
plish a  great  work.  He  who  knows  a  subject  of  importance  to  his 
people  and  tells  them  the  truth  even  though  it  be  distasteful,  renders 
the  public  a  distinct  service  and  deserves  the  highest  commenda- 
tion. [Applause] 

I  must  not  detain  you  longer.  I  thank  you  with  all  my  heart 
for  all  that  my  journey  to  this  beautiful  old  city  and  to  this  con- 
ference has  meant  to  me,  and  I  trust  that  the  opening  year  may  be 
surcharged  with  pleasure  and  progress  for  all  of  you.  [Applause] 


SYNOPSIS  OF  REMARKS  AT  STATE  TEACHERS  ASSO- 
CIATION, 1905,  SYRACUSE,  N.  Y. 

The  Commissioner  opened  the  discussion  by  a  casual  allusion 
to  an  article  on  Needed  Educational  Legislation  printed  on  the 
official  program,  and  relating  to  teachers'  salaries,  pensions, 
permanency  of  tenure,  etc.,  and  remarked  that  the  article  did  not 
seem  to  be  "  surcharged  with  spiritual  aim."  He  thought  such 
matters  all  right  as  mere  incidents,  but  not  entitled  to  highest  rank 
in  the  deliberations  of  a  great  state  association  of  teachers.  He 
would  help  increase  the  salaries  of  teachers  whenever  the  oppor- 
tunity came,  and  would  promote  pension  legislation  whenever  there 
could  be  any  general  or  logical  agreement  upon  the  subject,  but 
was  hardly  prepared  to  put  the  major  share  of  productivity  into 
such  matters.  As  to  permanency  of  tenure,  there  was  not  much 
more  to  be  desired. 

Dr  Draper  proceeded  to  say  that  since  the  unification  act  went 
into  effect  the  time  had  been  largely  occupied  in  combining  and 
reorganizing  the  Department  forces  and  methods  of  procedure. 
This  difficult  task  had  been  about  completed  and  the  Department 
was  now  ready  to  take  up  some  new  educational  business.  Not 
much  had  been  accomplished  as  yet,  but  the  time  had  come  for  a 
distinct  revival  of  educational  activity. 

He  thought  that,  speaking  generally,  the  teaching  force  had 
improved  decisively  in  the  last  two  decades,  and  not  much  was 
necessary  in  that  connection  except  to  keep  on  doing  what  had 
already  been  commenced,  with  such  occasional  incidental  changes 
in  plans  as  experience  would  suggest. 

The  Commissioner  thought  the  Department  and  all  interested  in 
the  educational  work  of  the  State  should  join  forces  to  accomplish 
the  following  ends  which  he  discussed:  . 

1  Better  professional  supervision  of  the  teaching  in  the  country 
schools. 

2  The  raising  of  low  grade  secondary  schools  up  to  the  standards, 
whether  they  were  large  schools  or  small  ones. 

3  The   more   complete    enforcement    of   compulsory   attendance 
and  child  labor  laws  with  a  view  to  the  reduction  of  illiteracy, 
which  was  much  too  great  in  the  State,  and  particularly  in  the 
rural  districts. 

53 


REMARKS    AT    STATE    TEACHERS    ASSOCIATION  59 

4  A  more  distinct  college  and  university  influence  in  all  of  the 
middle  and  lower  schools  and  in  all  of  the  other  educational  activi- 
ties of  the  State. 

5  A  stronger  feeling  of  fraternity"  between  public  and  private 
schools   and    between    all    agencies    for    uplifting    the    intellectual 
level. 

The  Commissioner  spoke  of  the  work  the  State  Department  was 
doing  in  the  asylums  and  prisons;  also  of  the  work  in  the  way  of 
establishing  and  developing  libraries  and  other  agencies  for  aiding 
people  to  improve  themselves  outside  of  the  schools. 

He  asked  all  teachers  to  study  in  the  next  year  the  subject  of 
business  and  trade  schools,  with  particular  reference  to  young 
children  who  will  probably  not  go  to  high  school  and  almost 
certainly  will  not  go  to  college.  He  thought  something  more 
decisive  and  logical  would  have  to  be  done  in  this  direction  and 
the  attitude  of  the  State  Department  should  be  taken  advisedly  and 
should  accord  with  the  best  sentiment  of  the  teachers  of  the  State. 

The  Commissioner  spoke  of  the  great  need  of  a  new  State 
building  for  the  State  Department,  including  the  State  Library 
and  State  Museum,  suggesting  the  stimulating  influence  of  such  a 
building  upon  the  intellectual  interests  of  the  State,  and  asking 
the  support  of  all  in  securing  it. 

In  conclusion,  Dr  Draper  urged  the  consolidation  of  all  edu- 
cational interests  and  the  truest  cooperation  between  all  educational 
forces,  giving  assurance  of  the  best  help,  without  fear  or  favor, 
that  the  Education  Department  could  give  and  soliciting  the  best 
support  that  all  interested  could  give  the  Department.  v 


INBORN  QUALITIES  IN  THE  CHARACTER  OF  GRANT 

GRANT'S  BIRTHDAY  EXERCISES,  STATE  NORMAL  COLLEGE 
ALBANY,  N.  Y. 

On  the  bluff  overlooking  the  old  town  of  Galena,  in  the  very 
northwestern  corner  of  Illinois,  stands  a  small  and  very  ordinary 
brick  house.  Nothing  distinguishes  it  from  other  houses  that  are 
common  in  the  neighborhood.  While  this  house,  in  that  place, 
forty-six  years  ago  was  doubtless  a  comfortable  habitation,  yet  the 
unpainted  front,  the  small  panes  in  the  windows,  the  wooden  steps, 
the  little  front  door,  and  the  narrow  hall  with  the  steep  stairs  com- 
ing down  to  the  entrance,  tell  us  plainly  that  it  was  not  above  the 
common  run  and  that  the  people  who  then  lived  in  it  must  have  been 
either  in  trying  circumstances  or  exceedingly  unpretentious. 

In  the  summer  of  1860  a  man,  wife,  and  four  children — three  boys 
and  a  girl,  the  oldest  eleven  years  of  age — became  tenants  of  this 
house.  The  man  was  thirty-eight  years  of  age.  He  had  been  born 
in  Ohio  of  very  intelligent  and  well  to  do,  but  not  conspicuous, 
parents.  In  his  boyhood  his  father  operated  a  tannery  and  owned 
a  farm.  The  lad  detested  the  tannery,  did  not  like  manual  work 
anyway,  but  had  to  do  it  and  preferred  that  upon  the  farm,  and 
particularly  that  in  which  horses  were  used.  He  went  to  school 
but  little.  In  one  way  and  another  he  managed  to  travel  about  more 
and  gained  wider  general  knowledge  than  any  other  boy  in  town. 
At  seventeen  his  father  procured  him  an  appointment  to  West  Point. 
He  did  not  want  to  go,  but  his  father  provided  the  necessary  reso- 
lution. He  showed  but  little  interest  in  strictly  military  affairs. 
His  study  of  the  tactics  was  not  enthusiastic  and  the  drill  seemed  a 
nuisance.  When  made  a  sergeant,  the  seventeenth,  and  there  were 
only  eighteen  in  the  battalion,  he  did  so  poorly  that  they  lost  little 
time  in  making  him  a  private  again.  But  his  sound  character,  his 
readiness  in  mathematics,  and  his  superior  horsemanship  saved  him, 
and  in  1843  ne  graduated,  number  twenty-one  in  a  class  of  thirty- 
nine. 

Stationed  at  Jefferson  Barracks  at  St  Louis,  as  a  brevet  second 
lieutenant  of  the  4th  Infantry,  he  employed  the  time  he  could  get 
away  from  the  routine  of  the  post  in  cultivating  the  acquaintance  of 
a  worthy  young  wroman,  whose  family  was  of  considerable  promi- 
nence and  lived  comfortably  five  miles  out  of  town.  He  had  been 
so  assiduous  about  this  that  when  he  was  ordered  away  to  the  war 
in  Mexico  she  promised  to  become  his  wife. 

60 


INBORN  QUALITIES  IN  THE  CHARACTER  OF  GRANT       6 1 

He  thought  the  war  with  Mexico  was  unholy,  but  he  followed 
the  flag  and  gained  some  distinction  as  a  strategist  and  a  straight, 
hard  fighter.  The  war  over,  he  married  and  then  served  with  the 
troops  upon  the  Pacific  coast  until  1854.  The  army  in  time  of 
peace  had  no  attractions  for  him,  certainly  none  which  compensated 
for  isolation  from  his  wife  and  children.  He  became  a  captain,  but 
the  pay  of  that  rank  would  not  support  his  family  on  the  other  side 
of  the  mountains  and  the.  enforced  separation  became  wholly  intoler- 
able. He  resigned  his  commission  and  came  home.  The  reasons 
for  resigning  and  the  manner  of  his  life  for  the  next  six  years  have 
been  called  in  question  by  some  writers.  There  is  no  reason  for  it. 
The  impulses  which  led  to  his  retirement  from  the  army  were  in  his 
nature  and  they  are  worthy  of  commendation.  Aside  from  that,  he 
was  not  in  strong  health :  he  inherited  some  tendencies  to  consump- 
tion. He  has  told  us  of  his  reasons  for  leaving  the  army  and  of  his 
manner  of  life  in  the  following  years.  His  word  removes  uncer- 
tainty. He  engaged  in  unimportant,  natural,  honorable  enterprises 
which  he  hoped  would  enable  him  to  live  with  and  support  his 
family.  His  undertakings  did  not  succeed  and  he  went  to  Galena 
to  share  in  the  leather  trade  with  his  father  and  brothers. 

Old  residents  of  Galena  say  he  made  but  little  impression  upon 
the  town.  He  was  quiet,  unobtrusive,  serious.  Once  or  twice  he 
was  asked  to  look  after  the  procession  at  a  local  celebration,  and  did 
it  noiselessly  and  well.  Beyond  this  he  was  unknown  and  little  seen 
except  in  the  store  and  on  his  coming  and  going  between  that  and 
the  house  on  the  hill.  On  these  walks  he  was  frequently  accom- 
panied by  some  of  his  children,  and  at  times  had  a  basket  on  his  arm. 
for  he  did  the  family  marketing  and  then  carried  the  meats  and 
vegetables  himself,  according  to  the  custom  of  the  time  and  the 
place. 

The  woman  of  the  family  was  substantial,  educated  above  the 
average  woman  of  the  time,  a  good  mother  and  a  genuine  housewife. 
The  children  were  like  other  children.  The  family  life  moved  for- 
ward in  the  ordinary  way.  We  can  readily  believe  that  there  was 
much  to  discourage,  for  there  was  nothing  to  foreshadow  future 
prominence.  But  we  know  that  the  family  was  happy,  for  it  was 
bound  together  by  love  which  could  endure  stress  and  storm. 

On  the  bluff  overlooking  the  Hudson  and  the  Palisades,  in  the 
upper  part  of  the  city  of  New  York,  upon  ground  at  once  pictur- 
esque and  historic,  hard  by  one  of  the  very  first  of  American  uni- 
versities, stands  a  magnificent  mausoleum.  It  compares  favorably 
with  any  structure  in  the  great  city,  or  indeed  in  the  land.  The 
tombs  of  Britain's  great  men  at  Westminster,  of  Napoleon  in  the 


62  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

heart  of  Paris,  of  the  Hohenzollern  kings  at  Potsdam,  of  Washing- 
ton at  Mount  Vernon,  of  Lincoln  at  Springfield,  are  not  more 
magnificent,  more  dignified,  more  impressive.  It  is  a  voluntary 
testimonial  to  a  great  national  character.  The  states  contended 
with  each  other  for  the  honor  of  providing  it;  but  the  people  estab- 
lished it  without  invoking  any  governmental  function.  In  the  crypt 
under  the  great  dome  stand,  side  by  side,  a  noble  pair  of  granite 
coffins.  One  holds  all  that  was  mortal  of  the  father  at  Galena,  and 
the  other,  by  his  special  stipulation,  has  since  received  the  body  of 
the  mother.  Over  all,  in  heroic  letters,  is  the  name  of  "  GRANT." 

Between  me  modest  home  at  Galena  and  the  great  mausoleum  at 
Morningside  Heights  there  developed  a  unique  career  of  universal 
human  interest.  It  extended  through  a  period  of  twenty-five  years. 
It  was  a  decisive  factor  in  making  the  course  of  history  in  America. 
It  will  never  cease  to  influence  the  thought  and  the  life  of  the  world. 

We  can  not  today  trace  all  the  lines  or  fill  in  all  the  details  of  that 
marvelous  career.  The  picture  is  a  completed  one  and  our  country- 
men are  familiar  with  it.  The  purpose  of  the  hour  is  to  point  out 
the  qualities  which,  when  the  opportunity  came,  led  that  career  to 
move  out  of  obscurity,  to  increase  steadily  in  volume  and  in  power, 
and  to  push  through  the  gravest  obstacles  and  the  severest  criticism 
to  the  very  pinnacle  of  world  fame  with  such  apparent  ease  and 
such  clockwork  naturalness  as  to  surprise  mankind. 

There  is  no  need  to  idealize  the  character  of  General  Grant:  in 
its  humanity  and  its  reality  it  appeals  to  the  world.  His  name  and 
his  fame  became  great  because  of  the  things  he  did.  But  what 
he  did  was  not  by  chance.  It  came  of  qualities  which  were  inherent 
in  his  character.  Those  qualities  were  sharpened  by  training  and 
seasoned  by  hard  experience,  it  is  true.  But  they  were  peculiarly 
his  own,  and  they  vere  so  independent  and  so  unexpected,  were 
expressed  in  ways  so  unlike  those  commonly  associated  with  con- 
spicuous military  achievement,  and  were  so  invariably  successful 
that  the  character  which  embodied  them  speedily  advanced  to  first 
place  in  the  esteem  of  his  countrymen  and  the  thought  of  mankind. 

The  conditions  which  were  to  require  him,  to  find  him,  and  to 
make  him  very  great  through  service  to  his  country,  had  not  arisen 
when  he  went  to  make  his  home  in  the  Illinois  town.  They  came 
in  the  following  year.  When  they  came  he  was  the  first  to  recog- 
nize them.  He  began  military  operations  at  ,once.  He  organized 
a  company,  and  rejected  the  proffer  of  its  command.  He  offered 
his  service  to  the  government  and  expressed  some  confidence  in  his 
ability  to  command  a  regiment.  His  overture  was  overlooked.  He 
went  to  the  capital  of  Illinois  and  engaged  in  military  work.  Some- 


INBORN    QUALITIES    IN    THE    CHARACTER   OF    GRANT  63 

thing  has  been  said  about  his  return  to  the  army  being  accidental; 
about  the  possibility  of  his  being  out  of  the  Civil  War  altogether. 
He  recognized  no  such  accident  or  possibility.  Circumstances  of 
time  or  place  or  rank  were  uncertain.  He  had  some  feeling  about 
what  he  could  best  do  or  about  what  might  belong  to  him.  He  was 
ready  to  pocket  it  if  need  be,  but  not  unless  it  need  be.  He  has  told 
us  that  not  for  a  moment  did  he  doubt  of  being  in  the  army  through 
the  war;  that  in  war  one  does  not  have  to  ask  leave  of  anybody  to 
fight  for  his  country.  As  a  fact  he  was  in  the  service  from  the  very 
beginning.  In  a  few  weeks  he  was  commanding  a  regiment,  and 
in  a  few  months  an  army. 

First  and  above  all  the  character  of  Grant  was  sincere.  In  mili- 
tary affairs  his  judgment  was  entirely  confident  and  almost  unerring; 
in  business  matters  it  might  slip ;  but  it  was  always  sincere  and 
just,  always  natural  and  always  genuine,  always  modest  and 
steadfast. 

The  world  had  associated  glittering  show  and  spectacular  effect 
with  military  genius.  He  hated  them.  He  wore  nothing  in  the  way 
of  a  uniform  beyond  the  requirements  of  the  regulations.  His  dress 
in  active  service  conformed  to  the  rough  conditions.  It  hardly 
seemed  to  be  a  uniform.  There  was  little  or  nothing  about  it  to 
sustain  his  rank.  In  his  eating  and  sleeping  he  accepted  the  lot  of 
the  ordinary  soldier.  In  his  work  he  could  outlast  them  all.  He 
loved  a  good  horse.  He  never  exhibited  himself  on  horseback. 
There  was  no  riding  along  the  lines  before  the  onset,  no  cavorting 
on  parade.  There  was  no  parade  unless  for  discipline.  But  he 
could  ride  through  wind  and  storm,  mud  and  slush,  days  and  nights 
together,  sick  or  well,  to  accomplish  military  ends.  No  reality  ever 
did  or  ever  will  appeal  to  the  American  heart  more  than  that  of  the 
commanding  general,  upon  a  good  horse,  in  the  Wilderness,  in  the 
pelting  rain  and  sleet,  in  the  now  historic  blue  overcoat  of  the 
common  soldier,  with  the  wounded  and  fluttering  life  of  the  nation 
in  his  keeping,  yet  as  calm  as  a  summer  morning,  as  precise  as  clock- 
work, as  confident  as  fate,  as  grim  as  death  itself. 

The  first  years  of  the  Civil  War,  at  the  fields  of  military  interest 
in  the  east,  were  marked  by  dress  and  parade,  by  marching  and 
countermarching,  by  the  pomp  of  officers,  the  multiplicity  of  orders, 
the  ready  assurances  of  early  and  overwhelming  victories.  But  not 
much  ground  was  gained.  Commanders  lacked  aggressiveness  or 
feared  failure,  and  when  the  sentiment  of  the  country  forced  a  move- 
ment the  slaughter  was  appalling,  and  without  compensating  results. 
The  gloom  was  deep  and  the  feeling  ominous. 

In  these  conditions  an  obscure  man,  without  bluster,  had  worked 
his  way  up  to  an  opportunity  in  the  west.  He  got  poor  encourage- 


64  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

ment  from  his  superiors ;  jealousies  assailed  and  intrigue  encom- 
passed him,  but  he  seized  the  opportunity  all  the  same.  He  drove 
the  enemy  out  of  Fort  Henry,  took  possession,  and  moved  at  once 
upon  Fort  Donaldson.  He  had  perhaps  fifteen  thousand  men :  there 
were  twenty-one  thousand  defending  the  fort.  He  invited  battle 
upon  an  open  field,  without  avail.  He  made  ready  for  the  assault 
by  land  and  water.  Just  as  the  advance  was  ordered  he  received  a 
note  from  the  Confederate  commander — his  old  comrade  at  West 
Point  and  in  the  Mexican  War —  asking  for  delay,  and  the  appoint- 
ment of  commissioners  to  arrange  capitulation.  Any  other  man 
would  have  accepted  the  overture  with  joy.  He  thought  one  could 
settle  the  terms  easier  than  two,  and  better  without  commissioners 
than  with  them,  and  replied,  "  No  terms  except  an  unconditional 
and  immediate  surrender  can  be  accepted.  I  propose  to  move 
immediately  upon  your  works.''  The  surrender  came  instantly  and 
upon  his  terms.  A  portion  of  the  garrison  had  escaped  in  the 
night,  but  sixteen  thousand  men  marched  out,  stacked  arms,  ate  his 
rations,  and  were  sent  to  the  north  as  prisoners  of  war.  The  man 
who  had  done  it  said  nothing  beyond  his  official  reports,  and  they 
were  the  briefest  possible  statements  of  facts,  devoid  of  self-lauda- 
tion, free  from  gush  and  speculation,  but  filled  with  the  confidence 
and  outlook  of  one  who  could  accomplish  things  even  upon  the 
dread  field  of  an  overwhelming  fratricidal  war. 

The  surprise  of  the  country  was  only  exceeded  by  its  joy.  Could 
it  really  be  that  a  man  had  done  something  of  consequence,  and 
without  talking  about  it?  How  the  great  heart  of  the  nation 
throbbed  at  the  news  of  a  substantial  and  unclouded  victory !  And 
how  the  people  stood  amazed  at  the  silence  and  the  modesty  of  the 
victor!  What  an  official  babel  there  must  have  been  when  a  man 
became  conspicuous  by  his  very  silence!  But  there  were  other 
officers  and  older  generals  in  the  service  who  had  not  planned  all 
this.  There  was  enough  of  official  consternation  and  shameful  self- 
love  in  high  military  places  to  remove  the  man  from  command ; 
but  the  voice  of  the  people  soon  put  him  beyond  danger  from  such 
things.  The  nation  gave  him  its  admiration  and  its  confidence. 
His  brief  reply  to  Buckner  became  the  slogan  of  the  Union  cause 
in  the  camps,  and  at  the  battle  front  of  the  armies,  and  in  the  homes 
and  upon  the  hustings  of  the  people.  Could  the  man  sustain  all 
this?  Had  he  the  qualities  which  could  stand  such  prosperity? 
Steadiness  and  quiet,  with  Shiloh,  and  then  Vicksburg  with  its 
thirty  thousand  prisoners  of  war,  soon  gave  the  answer.  After 
Chattanooga  and  Missionary  Ridge  he  was  accepted  as  the  coming 
general  in  chief  of  all  the  armies.  Congressional  thanks,  and 


INBORN  QUALITIES  IN  THE  CHARACTER  OF  GRANT       65 

medals,  and  presentation  swords,  and  promotions,  came  speedily. 
A  special  rank  was  created  for  him,  and  before  long  he  was  moved 
to  the  center  of  the  fearful  carnage  in  the  east  and  made  commander 
in  chief  of  all  the  armies  of  the  Union.  He  had  himself  become 
greater  and  stronger  through  the  two  years  of  wondrous  doing. 
The  armies  and  the  people  had  been  educated  also.  Steadily, 
silently,  confidently,  he  moved  on  to  the  mighty  climax,  leading 
greater  armies,  exercising  larger  powers,  assuming  weightier  re- 
sponsibilities, forcing  heavier  battles,  winning  yet  grander  victories. 
Spottsylvania,  Five  Forks,  the  Wilderness,  Petersburg,  Appomatox 
— these  brief  words  tell  the  fearful  and  the  wondrous  story. 

It  is  certainly  an  inspiration  to  see  an  obscure  man,  in  a  brief 
period  and  without  favoring  circumstances,  recognized  as  the  fore- 
most military  commander  produced  by  the  world  in  a  long  cycle  of 
time.  Other  qualities  than  sincerity  were  necessary  to  make  this 
possible.  What  were  they? 

He  proved  to  be  a  great  organizer.  The  objective  point  in  his 
military  organization  was  the  highest  efficiency  of  the  individual 
soldier.  The  soldiers  of  his  legions  were  citizens  and  freemen. 
He  knew  the  value  of  patriotic  devotion  and  of  free  and  safe  indi- 
vidual initiative  in  the  ranks ;  he  understood  the  methods  which 
would  produce  such  efficiency  as  could  be  secured  from  mercenaries, 
and  what  other  treatment  would  gain  that  higher  efficiency  which 
marks  the  cooperative  work  of  heroic  and  conscientious  freemen. 
In  his  own  character  he  combined  ^the  spirit  of  the  patriotic  citizen 
with  the  ways  of  the  trained  and  experienced  officer  of  the  regular 
army.  Commander  and  men  were  fighting  together,  not  for  pay, 
not  for  conquest,  not  for  a  soldier's  fame,  but  for  the  freedom  of  the 
oppressed,  for  the  life  of  the  Republic,  for  the  rehabilitation  and 
the  continuance  of  democratic  government  in  the  world.  His  mili- 
tary discipline  recognized  and  reckoned  with  this  great  fact.  Free- 
dom of  opportunity  and  adequate  support,  forceful  and  trustworthy 
leadership  with  a  modicum  of  control  would  enable  such  men  to 
swing  the  sword  of  the  nation  to  the  overthrow  of  its  enemies,  and 
then  bind  up  the  wounds  and  bring  together  the  sections  for  the  yet 
greater  unfolding  of  its  unparalleled  career. 

The  supply  and  medical  departments  of  his  armies  had  first  and 
best  care.  He  knew  the  need  of  rations  and  the  worth  of  shoes. 
The  law  of  the  camp  and  the  march  made  for  whatever  comfort 
could  be  obtained,  for  freedom  of  action,  for  self-control,  for 
enthusiasm,  for  elasticity,  and  for  fighting  power.  His  sense  of 
justice  was  clear  and  balanced,  quick  and  stern.  He  never  spoke 
in  sepulchral  tones  to  make  himself  impressive.  He  was  never 


66  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

known  to  be  excited  and  never  heard  to  use  an  oath.  He  tolerated 
no  nonsense:  he  accepted  no  lame  excuses:  he  regarded  no  rank. 
He  would  remove  a  division  commander  in  the  front  of  the  battle 
line  if  the  facts  seemed  to  require  it :  he  would  do  it  with  real  and 
manifest  regret,  but  he  would  not  hesitate  about  it.  If  in  time  he 
found  he  had  made  a  mistake  or  gone  too  far,  he  would  have  genuine 
satisfaction  in  making  the  best  amends  he  could  in  the  presence  of 
the  army,  or  before  the  country.  He  acted  upon  small  matters  and 
large  matters  with  equal  readiness.  He  dealt  with  every  problem 
presented :  he  decided  at  once :  his  ways  were  modest  and  quiet : 
his  words  were  few,  but  every  one  counted:  when  he  had  spoken 
the  thing  seemed  to  be  settled.  He  was  serious  but  he  did  not 
trouble  himself  about  results.  He  knew  his  ground  and  he  knew  his 
men.  There  might  be  an  immaterial  slip  here  and  there,  but  the 
general  results  were  the  ones  he  wanted.  The  armies  solidified : 
they  grew  in  strength  and  waxed  in  spirit:  they  gained  veteran 
form.  Led  by  such  a  citizen  and  such  a  soldier,  the  Union  Army 
of  citizen  soldiers  became  the  most  intelligent  and  the  most  scien- 
tific, the  most  extended,  the  freest,  and  yet  the  most  homogenous 
and  effective  fighting  machine  in  all  history. 

Grant  proved  to  be  a  strategist.  He  knew  personally  or  he  knew 
all  about  the  leading  men  to  whom  he  was  opposed,  and  reasoned 
with  much  accuracy  as  to  the  course  they  would  take.  He  studied 
the  field  and  saw  where  the  vantage  ground  would  be.  He  seemed 
able  to  see  from  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  a  campaign,  and  events 
happened  as  he  expected.  He  seldom  got  into  a  tight  place.  If 
he  was  surprised,  no  one  knew  it.  He  moved  his  forces  with 
celerity  and  in  ways  which  ensured  the  results  he  had  planned. 

But  if  he  was  a  strategist  by  intuition,  the  quality  was  not  the 
factor  he  depended  on  most  to  gain  his  triumphs.  His  battles 
were  won  by  straight,  hard  fighting.  He  took  the  initiative  and 
forced  the  issue.  He  gave  his  enemy  no  rest.  He  never  seemed 
to  care  about  what  his  enemy  might  do,  and  always  reasoned  that 
the  fellows  on  the  other  side  were  as  tired  and  certainly  as  scared 
as  he  was  himself.  No  one  will  ever  know  how  he  would  have  con- 
ducted a  defensive  campaign.  He  was  fitted  by  nature  to  lead 
offensive  campaigns.  He  did  not  rest  when  a  campaign  was  won. 
Before  one  end  was  gained  he  had  started  towards  another.  His 
self-confidence  was  and  is  startling.  In  the  Vicksburg  campaign 
he  called  in  the  division  commanders  and  asked  their  opinions.  He 
did  not  agree  with  them  and  he  disregarded  their  conclusions,  and 
says  in  his  "  Memoirs  "  that  that  was  as  near  as  he  ever  came  to  a 
council  of  war.  He  was  quite  accustomed  to  close  his  brief  report 


INBORN    QUALITIES    IN    THE    CHARACTER    OF    GRANT  67 

of  a  battle  won  by  saying  what  would  be  done  next  and  at  once. 
This  trait  appeared  early  and  remained  to  the  close  of  his  military 
activity.  Nothing  appalled  him.  In  the  midst  of  awful  events, 
when  the  intricacies  of  the  situation  wrere  paralyzing  and  the  com- 
motion distracting,  when  tens  of  thousands  of  lives  and  the  fate  of 
the  nation  seemed  to  depend  upon  what  he  did,  he  wrote  his  orders 
and  reports  with  readiness,  clearness,  and  confidence  most  amazing. 

Hear  anew  his  words  to  the  War  Department  in  the  darkest  hotfr 
of  the  Wilderness  campaign :  "  We  have  ended  the  sixth  day  of  very 
hard  fighting.  The  result  up  to  this  time  is  very  much  in  our  favor. 
But  our  losses  have  been  heavy,  as  well  as  those  of  the  enemy.  We 
have  lost  to  this  time  eleven  general  officers  killed,  wounded  and 
missing,  and  probably  twenty  thousand  men.  I  think  the  loss  of 
the  enemy  must  be  greater.  I  am  now  sending  back  all  my  wagons 
for  a  fresh  supply  of  provisions  and  ammunition,  and  propose  to 
-fight  it  out  on  this  line  if  it  takes  all  summer." 

He  set  at  naught  the  science  of  warfare  laid  down  in  the  books. 
He  was  criticized  for  it.  He  hunted  and  haunted  the  enemy.  He 
sought  battle  on  terms  equal  or  unequal.  Again  and  again  he 
hurled  the  legions  of  the  Union  against  a  brave,  and  alert,  and 
desperate  foe.  The  slaughter  was  heartrending.  At  home,  a 
thousand  miles  from  danger,  the  weaklings  quailed  and  the  poltroons 
called  him  a  butcher.  Nothing  could  be  more  outrageous.  There 
was  not  a  coarse  or  a  gross  thing  in  his  character.  No  man  was 
ever  moved  by  a  spirit  more  gentle,  or  directed  by  feelings  more 
tender.  He  hated  war.  He  realized  his  responsibility  and  knew 
for  what  he  stood.  He  felt  that  the  lives  of  his  armies,  and  to  an 
extent  the  lives  of  his  enemies,  were  in  his  hands.  He  was  an 
economist  in  human  life,  and  a  conservator  of  human  sorrow.  He 
knew  that  the  quicker  the  order,  the  heavier  the  onset,  the  hotter  the 
pursuit,  the  sooner  would  the  bright  sun  of  peace  break  through  the 
awful  clouds,  and  shed  its  light  over  a  Republic  which  had  proved 
its  right  to  live. 

The  inside  character  of  Grant  is  revealed  in  the  close  of  the  war 
even  clearer  than  in  its  conduct.  He  had  taken  for  the  guide  of  his 
personal  conduct  the  motto,  "  Treat  your  friend  so  that  if  he  be- 
comes your  enemy  he  can  do  you  no  harm,  and  treat  your  enemy  so 
that  he  may  become  your  friend  without  humiliation."  He  acted 
upon  it  in  all  the  events  of  his  military  career.  It  barred  familiari- 
ties on  the  one  side  and  left  no  room  for  jealousies  on  the  other.  No 
one  ever  doubted  his  independence:  no  one  ever  dreamed  of  coerc- 
ing him.  But  the  commanders  of  armies,  Sherman,  Sheridan, 
Thomas,  McPherson,  and  a  host  of  others  great  in  our  history,  for- 

5 


68  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

got  that  their  training  had  been  broader  and  their  experience  greater 
than  his,  as  they  gave  him  their  friendship  and  submitted  to  his 
clearer  vision,  his  surer  guidance,  his  more  unerring  justice.  So 
it  was  in  the  momentous  events  which  marked  the  very  climax  of 
his  military  career.  When  the  glad  hour  of  surrender  came  he 
yielded  all  that  a  chivalrous  and  generous  soul  could  give.  He  did 
what  he  could  to  make  peace  real,  and  to  have  industry  and  pros- 
perity follow  in  the  footsteps  of  peace.  But  he  knew  his  ground 
and  stood  to  it.  When  an  erratic  President  would  disavow  his 
parole  of  the  insurgent  armies  and  try  their  leaders  for  treason,  he 
threatened  to  resign  his  place  at  the  head  of  the  army  and  espouse 
the  cause  of  his  former  enemies.  When  Sherman  made  terms  with 
Johnson,  which  mixed  political  with  military  matters,  because  upon 
the  march  to  the  sea  he  had  been  out  of  touch  with  the  authorities 
for  many  weeks ;  when  Stanton  charged  Sherman  with  treason,  and 
the  country  was  in  an  uproar,  and  the  government  ordered  Grant  to 
hasten  to  Sherman's  headquarters,  take  command  of  his  army  and 
renew  hostilities,  the  General  in  Chief  slipped  down  into  the  Caro- 
linas,  set  Sherman  straight,  told  him  how  to  fix  the  matter  himself, 
and  left  before  the  army  or  the  enemy  knew  of  his  presence.  All 
that  he  said  and  all  that  he  did  in  those  days,  so  great  in  our  history, 
was  guided  by  generosity  to  his  brothers  in  arms,  by  his  keen  sense 
of  justice  to  all  the  world,  and  by  the  longing  of  his  soul  for  a 
genuine  and  lasting  peace. 

.  Doubtless  the  fame  of  Ulysses  S.  Grant  will  for  all  time  rest 
mainly  upon  his  military  achievements.  Great  as  those  achieve- 
ments were,  however,  they  are  very  far  from  constituting  the  sum 
of  his  service  to  the  country.  He  was  twice  nominated  to  the  presi- 
dency without  a  dissenting  voice  in  the  national  convention,  and 
twice  elected  by  overwhelming  popular  majorities.  History  has  not 
yet  done,  but  will  in  time  do,  his  two  terms  in  the  presidency  ade- 
quate justice.  No  executive  ever  stood  for  the  dignity  and  integrity 
of  the  Union  more  steadfastly  than  he,  or  did  it  in  more  troublous 
times. 

He  followed  a  Presidewt  who  was  not  in  sympathy  with  his  party, 
or  any  party,  whose  erratic  qualities  had  practically  paralyzed  the 
executive  departments  of  the  government  for  four  years.  Nothing 
had  been  done  towards  reconstructing  governments  in  the  insurrec- 
tionary states,  nothing  towards  recovering  the  law  where  war  had 
overthrown  it,  nothing  towards  settling  the  obligations  entailed  by 
the  war  and  resuming  the  normal  business  standards  and  financial 
methods  of  peace,  nothing  towards  resuming  the  relations  of 
brotherhood  and  restoring  a  true  Union,  nothing  towards  adjusting 


INBORN    QUALITIES    IN    THE    CHARACTER    OF    GRANT  69 

the  strained  relations  which  the  unusual  incidents  of  the  war  had 
made  with  many  foreign  powers.  There  were  scandals  touching 
the  federal  service.  The  President  may  have  been  too  confiding. 
He  knew  more  of  military  men  with  their  trained  obedience  to 
regime  than  of  men  who  make  their  living  out  of  politics.  On  all 
sides  the  hatreds  were  deep,  the  controversies  acrimonious,  the  out- 
look overcast  and  foreboding. 

The  man  was  in  a  new  place,  and  military  ways  would  no  longer 
suffice.  But  the  fundamental  qualities  of  his  character,  his  sim- 
plicity, and  his  genuineness,  still  served  him.  He  held  opinions  and 
expressed  them.  He  exercised  the  veto  power  freely.  He  sat  at 
the  head  of  the  council  table,  every  inch  the  President.  After  full 
opportunity  for  discussion,  the  quiet  man  at  the  head  of  the  table 
exerted  a  decisive  influence  upon  the  result.  There  was  new  aggres- 
siveness in  the  routine  of  administration.  The  star  route  thieves 
were  punished.  Irresponsible  clans,  which  met  new  conditions  and 
much  provocation  with  unlawful  and  murderous  methods,  were 
hunted  down.  The  moonshine  distilleries  were  destroyed.  The 
government  mails  and  the  government  engineers  began  to  go  freely 
on  their  way.  The  feeling  that  there  was  a  federal  power  strong 
enough  to  protect  its  officers  and  agents  in  the  performance  of  their 
work,  and  honest  enough  to  punish  those  who  abused  its  trust,  began 
to  abound  in  the  land. 

But  this  is  far  from  being  all.  Reconstruction  of  the  dismantled 
governments  in  the  insurrectionary  states  went  forward.  There  was 
great  bitterness  it  is  true.  There  were  many  mistakes  undoubtedly. 
The  conditions  were  unprecedented.  It  was  the  accepted  belief  that 
the  control  of  the  South  could  not  at  once  be  placed  in  the  hands 
which  had  but  just  prostrated  all  government  there.  The  present 
understandings  were  impossible  then.  The  men  through  whom 
the  administration  had  to  act  were  frequently  a  hard  lot.  But 
reconstruction  went  forward  all  the  same.  Before  the  end  of  his 
second  administration  the  Soldier  President  saw  the  legal  and  con- 
stitutional union  of  the  states  completely  restored. 

Happily  the  immaterial  things  in  administration,  the  things  which 
cause  the  most  commotion  because  all  can  talk  about  them,  are  in 
time  forgotten.  The  great  things  undertaken  by  a  steady  soul  and 
a  free  hand  remain  and  become  greater.  There  were  great  things 
done  by  President  Grant  which  will  become  yet  greater  in  the  light 
of  history.  He  helped  on  popular  education :  the  excellent  scientific 
work  of  the  government  is  largely  traceable  to  his  sympathetic 
feeling:  he  inaugurated  a  humane  and  rational  treatment  of  our 
Indian  wards:  he  was  the  first  President  to  stand  for  reform  in 


7©  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

appointments,  promotion  on  the  basis  of  merit,  and  protection  in  the 
civil  service.  The  fifteenth  amendment,  giving  citizenship,  regard- 
less of  color,  the  logical  sequence  of  our  political  theories  and  of 
emancipation,  became  a  part  of  the  Constitution  in  his  first  term. 

While  legal  rehabilitation  was  going  forward,  the  outlines  of  a 
new  Union  were  shaped  and  the  spirit  of  the  new  Union  was 
tempered  by  the  sense  and  the  sympathy  of  the  President.  The 
chief  instrument  of  war  became  the  main  reliance  of  peace. 

A  concrete  example,  which  may  never  have  been  in  print,  will 
illustrate.  Just  after  General  Grant  became  President,  at  the  hey- 
day of  patriotic  exultation,  the  Republican  members  of  the  Senate 
determined  in  conference  to  erect  in  the  city  of  Washington  a  more 
elaborate  memorial  of  the  triumph  of  the  Union  than  had  been 
dreamed  of  before.  The  intention  was  to  represent  all  the  forces 
•  of  the  Nation — the  Congress,  the  regular  and  volunteer  armies,  the 
navy,  the  auxiliary  organizations,  and  all  the  rest,  which  had  com- 
"bined  to  overthrow  the  Rebellion,  in  a  costly  and  enduring  group 
of  statuary  which  should  signify  the  fact  to  future  generations.  It 
was  easily  settled  in  the  party  caucus  that  the  figure  of  General 
Grant  should  typify  the  regular  army  in  this  group.  Then  a  com- 
mittee was  appointed  to  wait  upon  the  President  and  ask  his  cooper- 
ation in  the  enterprise  and  his  advice  as  to  other  figures  which  might 
be  included.  A  member  of  the  committee  has  since  described  the 
•interview  to  me.  The  impatience  of  the  President  was  scarcely  con- 
cealed while  the  plan  was  being  unfolded  to  him.  As  soon  as  it  was 
laid  bare  he  said  with  much  feeling  that  the  scheme  was  in  his 
judgment  a  bad  one,  that  he  had  no  claim  upon  his  countrymen 
beyond  that  of  all  other  men  and  women  who  had  done  what  they 
could,  that  the  last  things  the  nation  needed  were  reminders  of  the 
war,  that  the  representatives  and  the  people  of  the  South  were  to 
enjoy  Washington  with  the  representatives  and  the  people  of  the 
North,  and  that  nothing  should  be  erected  in  the  streets  of  that  city 
which  would  be  disagreeable  to  any  section  or  class  of  the  people, 
and  that  the  committee  must  be  assured  not  only  that  the  judgment 
of  the  President  was  opposed  to  their  conception  but  that  the  official 
attitude  of  the  President  would  be  positively  antagonistic  to  it. 
That  ended  the  particular  matter,  but  the  incident  illustrates  quali- 
ties which  were  inherent  in  a  great  man. 

Two  great,  conspicuous  acts  in  national  statesmanship  will  forever 
do  honor  to  the  sound  judgment  and  testify  of  the  personal  courage 
of  President  Grant  in  civic  administration.  Each  of  these  acts 
requires  a  book  for  adequate  exploitation.  They  must  be  passed 
with  a  paragraph. 


INBORN    QUALITIES    IN    THE    CHARACTER    OF    GRANT  7 1 

The  first  was  the  complete  settlement  of  our  troubles  with  Great 
Britain,  growing  out  of  the  unsympathetic  attitude  of  many  leaders 
of  the  party  in  power  in  English  politics  during  our  Civil  War,  and 
the  consequent  building  (in  English  ports)  of  the  Confederate  cruis- 
ers, which  in  our  sore  straits  had  taken  the  attention  of  our  armed 
vessels  away  from  the  suppression  of  the  Rebellion  and  driven  our 
merchant  marine  from  the  seas.     For  years  our  State  Department 
had  been  asserting  the  claims  of  American  citizens  to  reparation. 
The  demands  had  been  met  by  ridicule  in  the  English  press  and  dis- 
dain in  the  English  foreign  office.     The  American  jingoes  talked 
wyar.     The  President  caused  our  claims  to  be  asserted  with  dignity 
and  directness,  but  he  avowed  his  confidence  that  the  time  would 
come  when   the   English    sense  of   justice,   and   the   desirability   of 
international  comity,  would  lead  to  a  recognition  of  our  demands. 
War   for   the   collection   of  money   was   unthinkable.      He   neither 
sneaked  nor  blustered.     His  words  made  a  more  profound  impres- 
sion   abroad    than    at    home.      When    the    Franco-Prussian    War 
threatened  the  equilibrium  of  Europe,  apprehension  quickened  the 
English  sense  of  international  justice.      A   joint  high   commission 
was  appointed  to  take  the  matter  up.     When  the  commission  met 
the  British  representatives  refused  to  proceed,  or  even  to  consider 
the  arbitration  of  the  subject,  if  indirect  damages  were  to  be  insisted 
upon.     Direct  damages  meant  the  loss  directly  resulting  from  the 
destruction  of  property,  and  were  finally  measured  at  fifteen  million 
five  hundred  thousand  dollars.     Indirect  damages  covered  the  cost 
of  the  prolongation  of  the  war,  smart  money  for  injured  feelings, 
and  the  like,   and  were  estimated  at  from  two  to  three  thousand 
millions  of  dollars.     The  talking  element  of  the  dominant  party 
was  for  the  larger  demands :  the  fellows  who,  in  the  main,  fight  but 
with  their  tongues  were  for  war :  the  opposition  party  was  for  any- 
thing to  harass  and  sever  the  dominant  party.     The  President  said 
we  could  not  honorably  demand  what  Britain  could  not  honorably 
pay,  and  that  we  should  be  content  with  an  expression  of  regret  and 
the   payment   of   the   direct   losses.     There    was   a   great   political 
uproar.     There  was   intrigue  in  the  administration  councils.      But 
Grant  had  his  way.    His  way  recalled  Mr  Motley  from  the  English 
mission,  and  removed  Senator  Sumner  from  the  chairmanship  of 
the  committee  on  foreign  relations  of  the  Senate,  and  precipitated 
such  a  breach  in  his  party  that  a  large  element  refused  to  support 
him   for  reelection.     He  had  his  way  all  the  same:  and  his  way 
secured  fifteen  million  five  hundred  thousand  dollars  for  American 
claimants,  a  suitable  apology  from  the  government  of  Great  Britain, 
modifications  of  the  law  of  the  high  seas  which  have  come  to  be 


72  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

recognized  by  all  the  nations,  and  a  firmer  peace  with  the  mother 
country  and  all  the  world.  And  his  way  resulted  in  his  reelection 
with  a  decisiveness  both  unexpected  and  unprecedented. 

The  other  great  act  of  General  Grant's  presidency  was  the  veto 
of  the  bill  further  inflating  the  currency  and  further  deferring  the 
time  for  making  good  the  promise  of  the  government  to  redeem  its 
paper  obligations  in  coin.  His  trial  was  a  sore  one.  The  times 
were  hard.  The  country  had  just  passed  through  a  financial  panic. 
The  demand  for  more  circulating  currency  was  imperative.  The 
apparent  necessities  of  party  were  urgent.  A  clear  majority  of 
the  cabinet,  of  his  party  associates  in  Congress,  and  doubtless  of  the 
rank  and  file  of  the  party  which  had  twice  made  him  President, 
hoped  the  bill  would  be  signed.  The  President  listened.  At  the 
last  hour  he  went  to  his  library  late  at  night  and  all  by  himself  he 
wrote  one  message  to  Congress  signifying  his  reluctant  approval  of 
the  bill,  and  another  vetoing  it.  He  made  each  paper  as  strong  as 
he  could.  He  was  trying  himself.  .When  through,  he  determined 
that  the  veto  message  was  the  more  logical  and  sound.  He  sent 
it  in.  The  integrity,  the  business  sense  of  the  country  came  quickly 
to  the  support  of  his  attitude.  That  message  advanced  the  credit 
of  the  country  in  every  market  of  the  world  and  strengthened  the 
foundations  of  a  system  of  national  finance  capable  of  supporting 
the  industrial  and  commercial  evolution  of  our  rapidly  accumulating 
population.  It  did  more.  It  put  a  premium  upon  moral  courage 
and  developed  more  steadiness  and  stamina  in  the  homes,  and  the 
shops,  and  the  factories,  and  the  centers  of  trade  throughout  the 
land.  And  it  gained  us  larger  respect  at  every  seat  of  learning 
and  at  every  political  capital  in  the  world. 

In  a  tour  around  the  world,  following  his  presidency,  the  General 
received  every  mark  of  respect  and  honor  that  the  people  and  the 
governments  of  other  nations  could  show  him,  and  reached  home, 
by  way  of  the  Pacific,  amid  the  universal  acclaim  of  his  countrymen. 

So  warm  and  enthusiastic  was  the  expression  of  regard  that  mis- 
guided party  leaders  conjured  with  his  great  name  once  again  for 
the  presidency.  The  move  \vas  not  of  his  seeking.  His  attitude 
was  that  of  modest  and  passive  acquiescence  in  the  wishes  of  his 
people.  But  the  results  were  acrimonious,  humiliating,  in  some 
ways  tragic. 

But  his  fine  metal  never  lost  its  splendid  edge.  The  casual 
acquaintance  which  it  had  been  my  privilege  to  establish  with  him 
when  serving  as  a  member  of  the  committee  of  the  Legislature 
appointed  for  his  reception  and  entertainment  in  1881  made  it  proper 
for  me  to  pay  my  respects  to  him  when  we  met  in  a  Chicago  hotel 


INBORN    QUALITIES    IN    THE    CHARACTER   OF    GRANT  73 

in  1882.  As  we  conversed  there  came  a  knock  at  the  door.  Open- 
ing it,  the  General  read  the  name  upon  a  card  that  was  handed  him 
and  instantly  said  to  the  boy,  "  You  will  tell  this  person  that  I  do 
not  want  to  see  him."  Partly  closing  the  door  and  then  opening 
it  again  he  repeated,  "  Boy,  please  remember  precisely  what  I  say : 
you  will  tell  this  person  that  I  do  not  want  to  see  him."  His  man- 
ner was  as  unruffled  as  the  summer  sun.  "  Why  did  you  not  say 
that  you  were  engaged,"  inquired  Mrs  Grant.  "  Because,  if  I  had 
he  would  have  come  again,"  was  the  reply.  Wifely  interest  forced 
an  immediate  though  somewhat  reluctant  and  embarrassing  explana- 
tion :  "  Well,  that  was  a  reporter  from  a  daily  paper  which  wants  an 
interview,"  the  General  said.  "  Yesterday  this  paper  abused  Presi- 
dent Arthur  for  appointing  Colonel  Walter  Evans  of  Louisville  as 
Commissioner  of  Internal  Revenue,  on  the  ground  that  he  had  once 
supported  me.  The  paper  has  the  right  to  condemn  the  President 
and  also  the  right  to  criticize  me,  but  when  it  condemns  the  Presi- 
dent for  nothing  but  because  he  appoints  an  old  and  entirely  worthy 
friend  of  mine  to  office  it  is  time  that  I  resent  it."  Who  shall  say 
that  this  was  not  proper  discrimination  prompted  by  commendable 
self-respect  ? 

His  remaining  years  were  encompassed  by  bitter  suffering  and 
sorrow.  He  thought  his  sons  might  be  as  successful  in  the  business 
as  he  had  been  in  the  military  world.  Who  can  blame  him  for 
that?  He  gave  his  name  to  a  firm  in  Wall  street  embracing  his 
sons  and  another.  The  other  proved  a  polished  scoundrel  and  pulled 
down  financial  ruin  and  debt  and  intense  humiliation  upon  an 
honored  head.  The  General  gathered  up  all  he  had,  and  pawned 
his  medals  and  presentation  swords,  to  meet  his  obligations.  But 
this  was  by  no  means  the  sum  of  his  suffering. 

Although  his  sturdy  will  gave  him  great  endurance,  his  body  was 
never  strong.  Pain  was  very  familiar  to  him  and  he  seemed  spe- 
cially susceptible  to  accidents  and  hurts.  Many  times  in  his  cam- 
paigns he  had  to  rise  above  serious  bodily  suffering  to  command 
the  issue  of  great  events.  In  1884  he  had  a  fall  which  compelled 
him  to  go  upon  crutches  for  months,  and  from  which  he  never 
recovered.  The  last  time  I  saw  him  was  when  he  came  into  Mr 
Elaine's  room  at  the  Fifth  Avenue  Hotel  on  crutches  to  pay  his 
respects  to  the  candidate  of  his  party,  although  the  two  men  had 
never  been  in  personal  accord.  Just  after  this,  disease  in  its 
dreadest  form  fastened  upon  him. 

He  commenced  to  write  the  history  of  his  life,  that  the  proceeds 
might  provide  his  family  the  means  of  living.  The  dread  mes- 
senger stood  at  his  elbow  and  withheld  the  service  of  the  summons 


74  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

that  he  might  complete  his  self-imposed  and  gracious  task.  The 
cancerous  growth  in  his  throat  made  the  suffering  intense  and  in 
time  speech  became  impossible.  He  never  murmured :  his  calm- 
ness and  steadiness  were  as  sure  as  ever :  his  heart  grew  yet  warmer 
to  his  people,  his  mind  yet  clearer  upon  the  enduring  interests  of 
his  country,  as  he  went  on  with  his  writing.  And  as  he  wrote  of 
reconciliation  between  the  sections  and  the  factions,  the  old  bitter- 
ness did  give  way,  the  love  of  all  his  countrymen  gathered  around 
him,  and  the  people  became  united  in  a  common  sorrow. 

To  his  physicians  he  expressed  the  hope  that  they  could  be  instru- 
mental in  prolonging  his  life  that  he  might  finish  his  work.  As  he 
worked,  the  last  act  of  the  Forty-eighth  Congress  created  for  him 
anew  the  grade  of  General  in  the  army,  which  he  had  vacated  upon 
his  accession  to  the  presidency,  and  the  final  act  of  President 
Arthur's  administration  placed  him  in  it.  In  all  this,  partizanship 
receded  and  was  stilled.  With  one  accord  the  people  of  all  sections 
and  all  opinions  demanded  it.  His  life  was  prolonged  until  his 
task  was  finished.  He  closed  the  book  with  the  words,  "  Man  pro- 
poses, but  God  disposes."  It  was  his  last  will.  It  ensured  his 
family  a  competency.  It  gave  to  his  country  a  noble  example,  a 
benediction,  and  an  inspiration.  It  was  all  he  had  to  give.  But  it 
was  much.  It  was  more  than  any  other  of  his  generation  could 
give.  With  work  finished,  he  waited  the  end  with  composure  and 
with  confidence,  and  the  thought  of  all  the  people  gathered  at  the 
cottage  on  the  mountain  top  to  await  the  end. 

On  the  morning  of  July  23,  1885,  on  my  usual  walk  to  daily  duties 
in  the  capital  of  the  nation,  I  had  stopped  a  moment,  as  was  my 
wont,  to  admire  the  beautiful  equestrian  statue  of  McPherson,  the 
gallant  commander  of  the  Army  of  the  Tennessee,  whose  life  was 
given  to  his  country  before  Atlanta.  There  was  a  sharp  stroke  by 
the  fire  alarm  on  the  city's  bells.  I  looked  up  to  the  flag  on  the 
Treasury  Department,  and  instantly  it  dropped  half  way  down  the 
staff.  Looking  at  my  watch  it  was  8.24;  and  I  knew  that  but  a 
moment  before  the  light  had  flickered  out  on  Mt  McGregor,  that  a 
devoted  husband  and  father  had  passed  out  of  a  loving  family  circle, 
that  a  great  national  character  had  passed  on  to  the  inexorable 
judgment  of  history,  and  that  a  kingly  spirit  which  had  put  itself 
at  peace  with  all  the  world  was  at  one  with  the  hereafter. 

We  knew  before  today  that  General  Grant  had  the  gift  of  military 
genius.  The  ground  over  which  the  hour  has  carried  us  must 
have  illustrated  the  fact  that  he  had  other  qualities  which  were  very 
great.  They  by  no  means  made  for  strife ;  they  by  no  means  pointed 
to  war.  They  were  factors  in  civic  as  well  as  in  military  leadership. 


INBORN  QUALITIES  IN  THE  CHARACTER  OF  GRANT       75 

Sincerity,  genuineness,  gentleness,  patience,  steadiness,  judgment, 
force,  endurance,  self-respect  and  patriotism  were  inborn  qualities 
of  his  character,  and  peace  was  the  best  loved  word  in  his 
vocabulary. 

The  last  public  scene  in  the  career  of  this  great  captain  was  not 
what  he  would  have  made  it,  but  it  was  very  properly  an  imposing 
one.  The  people  moved  by  common  impulse  to  our  great  city  by 
the  sea.  The  offices,  and  shops,  and  marts  of  trade  were  closed. 
The  press,  the  pulpit,  the  schools,  the  clubs,  gave  expression  to  the 
universal  grief.  The  army  and  navy  of  the  United  States  were 
there  in  impressive  form.  The  veterans  of  the  Union  armies  he 
had  commanded,  and  of  the  Confederate  armies  he  had  opposed, 
gathered  in  fraternal  concord,  to  signify  their  affectionate  and 
patriotic  sorrow.  The  President  and  his  Cabinet;  the  Congress; 
the  Supreme  Court ;  the  officers,  the  legislatures  and  the  militia  of 
the  states ;  and  civic  organizations  without  number,  joined  in  the 
long  march  to  the  tomb.  The  cortege  reached  from  the  Battery 
to  Morningside,  and  beyond.  And  through  the  August  heat  of 
the  great  city,  through  a  throng  of  sorrowing  people  so  great  that 
no  man  could  number  it,  the  endless  line  of  civic  black  and  military 
white,  and  crimson,  and  blue,  and  gold,  with  arms  reversed  and 
banners  draped,  with  slow  music  and  measured  tread,  bore  the 
mortal  remains  of  Grant  to  their  dignified  and  historic  resting  place 
on  the  banks  of  the  Hudson,  to  the  shade  of  a  great  university,  and 
to  that  peace  which  he  had  longed  for  so  fondly  and  had  done  so 
much  to  conquer.  "Ashes  to  ashes :  dust  to  dust."  He  has  gone ; 
but  the  memory  of  such  an  one  remains  and  becomes  the  splendid 
inspiration  of  the  nation,  the  priceless  heritage  of  the  generations 
which  follow  after. 


ADDRESS     AT     THE     COMMENCEMENT     EXERCISES     OF     THE     ALBANY 
MEDICAL    COLLEGE,   UNION   UNIVERSITY 

Mr  Chancellor,  Mr  Dean,  and  more  especially  you,  Young  Men 

of  the  Class  of  1906: 

You  are  entering  the  medical  profession.  You  have  had  a  very 
substantial  preparatory  training  and  have  been  given  about  all  your 
heads  will  hold  of  the  theoretical  technic  and  methods  of  medicine. 
The  difference  in  capacity  between  now  and  when  you  have  come 
to  be  fifty  years  of  age,  and  the  difference  in  quality  between  what 
you  get  through  lectures  and  will  get  from  practice  are  rather 
delicate  matters  which  I  haven't  the  heart  to  obtrude  upon  you  in 
the  presence  of  your  mothers  and  sisters,  and  other  fellow's  sisters, 
who  have  come  to  add  to  the  gaieties  of  your  graduation  day. 

Moreover,  I  am  without  the  knowledge,  and  trust  I  am  lacking  in 
the  temerity,  to  attempt  to  discuss  the  technical  or  scholarly  or 
professional  side  of  medicine.  Happily  it  is  unnecessary  because 
you  are  so  full  of  theory  that  you  could  not  absorb  more  of  that 
kind  of  thing  just  now.  Moreover  since  assuming  the  burden  of 
this  address,  and  in  contemplation  of  it,  I  have  read  a  recent  maga- 
zine article  on  the  Ebers  papyrus,  found  between  the  legs  of  a 
mummy  laid  away  some  seven  thousand  years  ago,  which  shows 
that  doctors  were  earnest  if  not  so  common,  that  diseases  were 
about  as  well  known  and  as  well  classified,  and  that  the  uses  of 
drugs  were  about  as  well  recognized  then  as  now.  Instead  of  aiding 
me,  this  article  has  forced  me  to  abandon  some  'contemplated 
observations  upon  the  later  history  of  the  medical  profession  and 
the  marvelous  progress  of  modern  medicine.  But  there  are  some 
things  which  any  intelligent  or  experienced  layman  may  say  which 
ought  to  command  the  interest  of  the  medical  profession.  From  a 
point  of  view  outside  of  the  profession,  and  yet  out  of  an  experience 
that  no  one  can  say  is  very  brief,  and  also  out  of  my  every  day 
official  business,  some  observations  ought  to  be  evolved  which  are 
worthy  of  your  graduation  hour  and  of  a  moment's  thought. 

You  are  entering  into  relations  with  the  medical  profession. 
What  is  a  profession,  anyway?     It  is  an  association  of  persons 
united  in  spirit  because  engaged  in  the  same  business,  occupied 
by  the  same  studies,  and  moved  by  the  same  aims.     The  business 
can  not  be  performed  by  mere  physical  effort,  nor  indeed  by  mere 

76 


FACTORS    IN    THE    MAKING    OF    THE    MEDICAL    PROFESSION         77 

repetition  and  copying.  It  is  intellectual  business  and  must  rest 
upon  a  scientific  basis.  There  must  be  training  for  it  which  will 
enable  one  to  recognize  somewhat  obscure  indications,  to  ascertain 
facts  on  his  own  account,  to  reason  logically  about  them,  and  to 
come  to  independent  conclusions  worthy  of  the  common  support 
of  all  because  the  conclusions  are  the  inevitable  result  of  man's 
sincere,  intellectual,  experimental,  study  of  God's  unalterable 
truths.  Between  these  persons  there  must  be  respect  and  frater- 
nity: there  must  be  genuineness  and  generosity.  Jealous  regard 
for  the  honor  of  the  gild  must  control  the  meannesses  which  were 
given  in  some  measure  to  all  of  us,  and  genuine  enthusiasm  for  the 
success  of  the  gild's  business  must  travel  in  double  harness  with 
earnest  desire  for  the  progress  of  the  world's  good.  Moving  and 
inspiring  these  persons  there  must  be  a  proud  history,  stirring 
traditions,  time-honored  usages,  mountain  peaks  of  particular 
achievement,  and  a  literature  with  substance,  flavor,  and  inspiration 
in  it. 

There  is  no  profession  with  a  longer  or  a  more  eventful  history 
than  medicine:  there  is  none  marked  by  such  serious  study  or  such 
splendid  accomplishment:  there  is  none  whose  work  must  not  of 
necessity  be  expressed  by  tongue  or  pen  which  has  such  a  volumi- 
nous literature:  there  is  none  upon  which  men  and  women  are  so 
absolutely  dependent ;  and  there  is  none  so  attractive  to  scoundrels 
and  so  sheltering  to  scoundrelism,  in  spite  of  all  that  multitudes 
of  anxious  physicians  and  all  decent  people  have  seemed  able  to  do. 

Not  until  recent  years  has  it  been  deemed  necessary  in  America 
to  surround  the  medical  profession  with  legal  safeguards  and 
regulations.  In  all  of  the  leading  countries  of  Europe — England, 
France,  Germany,  Norway,  Sweden,  Russia,  Austria-Hungary, 
Greece,  Italy,  Switzerland, — admissions  to  the  medical  profession 
were  regulated  by  law  and  conditioned  upon  serious  scientific 
training  before  there  was  much  done  in  that  direction  by  any 
American  state.  In  all  of  these  countries  the  conditions  of  admis- 
sion are  probably  more  exacting  now  than  in  any  American  state. 
In  this  land  of  the  free,  where  so  many  people  seem  to  think  that 
nobody  is  to  be  prevented  from  doing  anything,  the  time  is  very 
distinctly  remembered  when  the  very  common  usage  implied  that 
holding  a  doctor's  horse,  attending  the  door,  and  picking  up  the 
catchwords  and  forms  of  medical  practice,  were  about  all  that  was 
needed  to  qualify  one  for  the  legal  right  to  practise  in  the  medical 
profession.  The  laws,  made  by  the  legislatures  and  laid  down  by 
the  judges,  assumed  without  sufficient  reason  that  the  natural 
intelligence  and  self-interest  of  the  people  were  all  that  were  neces- 


78  NEW   YORK    STATE   EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

sary  to  protect  them  from  imposition.  Not  until  long  after  the 
universities  had  developed  medical  faculties  and  these  faculties, 
with  the  more  commercial  and  ephemeral  medical  schools,  had 
turned  out  many  men  who  were  trained  in  general  culture,  in 
scientific  research,  and  in  practical  experience,  was  the  medical 
practice  placed  upon  any  lawful  or  professional  footing. 

Nineteen  years  ago  it  was  my  honor  and  pleasure,  as  now,  to 
make  the  commencement  address  to  the  graduating  class  of  the 
Albany  Medical  College.  At  that  time  only  five  states  in  the 
Union  exacted  an  examination  for  a  license  to  practise  medicine. 
The  only  sure  basis  of  training — graduation  from  a  recognized  and 
approved  school  of  medicine — was  nowhere  insisted  upon.  Now 
a  diploma  from  a  recognized  medical  college,  in  addition  to  a 
licensing  examination  defined  by  statute,  is  required  in  26  states. 
In  31  states  a  medical  diploma  alone  does  not  confer  the  right  to 
practise,  and  but  eight  of  these  states  require  nothing  more  than 
an  examination. 

It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  in  erecting  this  legal  and  recog- 
nizable basis  for  medical  practice  in  America,  New  York  has  been 
distinctly  foremost  among  the  states.  Her  experience  has  shown 
her  the  necessary  steps:  she  has  been  the  first  and  gone  the  furthest 
in  taking  those  steps,  and,  wherever  professional  self-respect  is 
the  keenest  and  public  sentiment  is  the  ripest,  other  states  are 
following  her  footsteps  in  the  effort  to  gain  her  plane. 

And  it  takes  nothing  from  the  great  credit  which  belongs  to  many 
others  to  say  that  the  largest  single  share  of  honor  for  this  splendid 
advance  is  due  to  one  whose  professional  skill  and  reputation  has 
recently  led  to  his  advancement  to  the  presidency  of  the  American 
Surgical  Association;  who  is  just  now  on  his  way  from  Europe 
where  he  has  been  to  represent  the  American  medical  profession  at 
the  International  Congress  of  Physicians  and  Surgeons;  who, 
happily,  was  only  last  week — and  in  his  absence — again  elected  a 
Regent  of  the  University  of  the  State  of  New  York  by  the  Legislature 
because  of  the  distinct  need  which  the  State  has  of  his  service  to 
medical  learning, — the  enthusiastic  though  gentle  guide  of  the 
Albany  Medical  College — Dr  Albert  Vander  Veer. 

When  we  specify  the  conditions  of  admission  to  medical  practice 
in  New  York,  we  point  out  the  most  exacting  requirements  in 
America.  They  have  been  fixed  by  men  of  large  experience  and 
very  high  ideals  in  the  profession  and  by  courageous  men  in  public 
life  who  have  been  willing  to  follow  the  best  professional  leadership. 
All  admissions  to  practice  must  be  upon  examination  by  a  state 
board  of  medical  examiners,  appointed  by  and  under  the  supervision 


FACTORS    IN    THE    MAKING    OF    THE    MEDICAL    PROFESSION         79 

of  the  Board  of  Regents  of  the  University  of  the  State  of  New  York, 
and  before  one  is  allowed  to  take  the  examination  the  following 
facts  must  appear: 

1  He  must  be  21  years  of  age.     If  nature  has  its  course,  that  is 
easily  met. 

2  He  must  have  good  moral  character.     So  long  as  this  may 
be  proved  by  the  certificates  of  friends,  it  will  not  be  difficult. 

3  He  must  have  four  years  of  satisfactory  preliminary  prepara- 
tion in  an  approved  school  of  academic  grade.     This  is  arbitrary 
and  there  is  no  dodging  it.  » 

4  He  must  have  four  years  of  satisfactory  work  in  an  approved 
school  of  medicine.     This  is  also  arbitrary  and  has  to  be  completely 
performed.     The  specified  work  in   institutions    of  approved  aca- 
demic  and  professional     standards  is  the  all-important   advance. 
Plans  for  establishing  a  combined  college  and  professional  course, 
which  will  shorten  the  time  one  year,  are  in  progress.     It  is  clearly 
desirable  that  everything  be  done  to  economize  time  and  encourage 
the    scientific   preparation   in   the    universities.     Institutions    are 
stronger  than  individuals:  organized  and  public  training  is  more 
substantial  than  individual  and  private  tutoring.     The  universities 
train  in  the  fundamental  sciences  much  better  than  the  average 
school  of  medicine  is  likely  to  do. 

5  He  must  have  the  degree  of  bachelor  or  doctor  of  medicine, 
conferred  by  an  approved  and  registered  medical  school  having 
authority  to  confer   it. 

One  who  has  all  these  qualifications,  and  in  addition  thereto  is 
fortified  with  $25,  may  enter  the  State  medical  examination,  and 
if  he  passes  it  the  board  of  examiners  will  certify  that  fact  and 
he  will  then  receive  from  the  Regents  of  the  University  a  license  to 
practise  medicine  in  New  York  State,  which  he  must  register  in  the 
clerk's  office  of  the  county  in  which  he  is  to  try  to  do  business,  and 
then  he  may  practise  the  healing  art  upon  all  who  think  they  stand 
in  need  of  it,  and  will  permit  him. 

Now  it  would  be  wholly  unjust  to  exact  all  this  of  our  own  medical 
schools  and  our  own  medical  students,  and  then  allow  physicians 
and  surgeons  who  have  been  licensed  in  other  states,  where  the 
schools  are  less  substantial  and  the  exactions  are  less  severe,  to 
come  in  here  on  the  same  plane  as  our  own  practitioners.  To  stop 
this,  no  one  is  allowed  to  come  in  from  another  state  without  exam- 
ination, but  the  University  is  authorized  to  register  and  recognize 
work  in  medical  schools  in  other  states,  and,  indeed,  in  other  coun- 
tries, where  the  minimum  graduation  standard  is  not  less  than  that 
fixed  by  our  statutes  for  New  York  medical  schools,  and  to  admit 


80  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

their  graduates  to  the  examination  provided  they  have  the  other 
qualifications  required;  and  the  University  may  also  accept  not 
less  than  five  years'  reputable  practice  by  a  practitioner  in  another 
state  in  lieu  of  both  the  preliminary  and  professional  training,  but 
only  to  the  extent  of  permitting  him  to  try  the  examination. 

The  statutes  also  authorize  the  University  to  indorse  medical 
licenses  granted  in  another  state  so  as  to  make  them  good  in  this 
State,  when  satisfied  that  the  requirements  in  the  other  state  are  as 
exacting  as  in  this  State,  and  that  the  other  state  will  reciprocate 
in  like  manner ;  but  little  has  yet  definitely  resulted  from  this  author- 
ity because  but  one  or  two  states  are  able  to  meet  our  standards 
of  requirement. 

The  only  states  with  legal  standards  fixed  in  the  law  which  permit 
reciprocity  are  New  Jersey  and  Michigan.  We  have  recently  had 
negotiations  with  New  Jersey  which  have  led  to  an  acceptance  of 
their  medical  licenses  here  and  of  ours  there.  Some  other  advances 
in  that  direction  have  been  made.  Some  discussion  of  the  matter 
is  now  in  progress  with  the  medical  authorities  of  Pennsylvania. 
But  there  must  clearly  be  legislation  in  Pennsylvania,  as  in  prac- 
tically all  other  states,  before  we  can  accept  their  licenses.  But 
many  are  moving.  At  a  conference  of  state  medical  examining 
and  licensing  boards  held  last  week  at  Columbus,  O.,  at  which  Ohio, 
Illinois,  Indiana,  Iowa,  Michigan,  Kentucky,  Wisconsin,  and  per- 
haps some  other  states,  were  represented,  three  determinations  of 
very  considerable  importance  were  reached: 

1  It  was  determined  to  adopt  in  the  different  states  the  New 
York  standards  of  measurement  of  preliminary  education.     The 
term  "count"  is  to  be  used  and  is  to  uniformly  mean  one  recita- 
tion a  week  for  a  year  in  a  recognized  high  school  or  academy. 

2  It  was  determined  to  recommend  that  a  medical  student's 
certificate  entitling  to  admission  to  a  professional  school  shall 
represent  60  counts,  30  of  these  counts  to  be  in  specified  subjects, 
of  which  10  shall  be  in  English,  10  in  mathematics,  5  in  Latin  and  5 
in  physics,  with  the  further  provision  that  after  1908  there  shall 
be  required  10  counts  in  Latin.     This  is  of  course  not  enough, 
but  it  is  a  fair  start. 

3  A   committee  was  appointed  to  arrange   a  medical  school 
course  which  shall  be    at    least   uniformly  required  as  the  basis 
of  the  medical  license,  and  it  was  determined  that  this  must  em- 
brace bacteriology,  histology,  embryology,  osteology,  anatomy, 
physiology,  toxicology  and  chemistry.     Again,  it  must  be  said 
that  this  is  not  enough  but  it  is  a  good  start. 


FACTORS    IN    THE    MAKING    OF    THE    MEDICAL    PROFESSION         8l 

All  of  these  determinations  were  reached  with  unanimity.  These 
conferences  and  the  boards  which  they  represent  are  without  legal 
competency  to  enforce  these  determinations,  but  the  best  profes- 
sional sentiment  is  setting  rightly  in  the  western  states,  and 
when  those  states  really  start  to  do  a  thing  they  do  it  very 
abundantly.  New  York  has  peculiar  satisfaction  in  seeing  her 
policies  accepted  with  such  courage  in  the  great  central  states 
as  to  promise  their  general  adoption  in  the  nation. 

The  New  England  states  are  singularly  delinquent  about  state 
standards  for  admission  to  the  medical  profession.  The  reasons 
are  obvious  but  the  fact  is  likely  to  stand  in  the  way  of  inter- 
state professional  comity  for  a  considerable  time.  However,  it 
must  not  be  overlooked  that  there  are  many  medical  schools  of 
high  grade  in  New  England,  graduating  large  numbers  of  thor- 
oughly trained  young  men,  and  it  would  be  manifestly  unreason- 
able to  doubt  that  the  leaders  of  the  medical  profession  in 
several  of  the  eastern  cities  are  at  least  as  learned,  as  skilled  and 
as  high  minded  as  any  in  the  world.  The  trouble  is  not  that 
New  England  is  lacking  in  learned  medical  men  but  that  she  does 
not  shut  out  the  ignorant  or  dishonest  ones. 

California,  Michigan,  New  Hampshire  (a  good  and  lonely 
exception  in  the  New  England  States),  New  Jersey,  New  York, 
Ohio  and  Wisconsin  are  the  only  states  which  require  a  full 
high  school  course  before  the  medical  school  and  the  state 
examination.  In  the  other  states  the  admission  requirements 
at  the  medical  schools  are  very  slight.  No  state  requires  a  col- 
lege course  in  advance  of  the  professional  school,  but  the  schools 
of  medicine  of  Harvard  and  Johns  Hopkins  universities  do  re- 
quire it.  In  twenty-six  states  a  diploma  from  a  recognized 
medical  school  must  precede  and  be  followed  by  a  state  licens- 
ing examination,  and  in  nine  other  states  there  must  be  a 
licensing  examination,  without  the  medical  school  diploma, — 
but  of  course  there  are  schools  and  schools,  and  examinations 
and  examinations. 

There  are  many  other  statutory  provisions,  and  many  penal- 
ties for  evading  the  law  in  New  York  which  are  intended,  so  far 
as  lawmaking  can  do  it,  to  insure  substantial  character  and 
scientific  competency  in  the  medical  profession,  and  to  protect 
the  people  against  charlatanism  and  chicanery  and  violations  of 
the  law  are  now  being  prosecuted  with  considerable  vigor. 

But  I  have  already  given  more  time  to  this  side  of  my  theme 
than  I  can  afford,  for  I  want  to  present  another. 


82  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

Not  because  of  any  suspicion  that  you  are  not  all  honorable 
men,  but  because  you  hear  so  much  and  must  needs  think  so 
much  upon  the  laws  which  fix  the  conditions  of  admission  to  the 
medical  profession,  and  because  the  profession  claims  such  excep- 
tional manhood,  I  must  remind  you  that  the  wisest  laws  can  only 
protect  and  can  not  make  a  profession,  and  that  he  who  enters 
here  with  any  expectation  of  winning  honorable  place  in  this  pro- 
fession must  more  than  meet  the  bare  demands  of  the  laws.  He  must 
have  plans  in  his  mind  and  purposes  in  his  heart  which  will  help 
enforce  the  laws  but  are  wholly  above  and  independent  of  the  law. 

The  gist  and  essence  of  a  learned  profession  must  appear  in 
the  learning  and  high  mindedness  of  its  members ;  in  their  pride 
in  its  history;  in  their  jealous  regard  for  its  good  name;  in  their 
eagerness  for  their  share  in  the  fraternal  spirit  which  pervades 
it,  and  in  their  sincere  desire  and  intelligent  power  to  give  it 
character  and  make  it  serviceable  to  mankind.  No  man  has  any 
right  to  become  a  load  upon  a  profession.  If  he  enters  one  think- 
ing of  the  commercial  advantage  it  is  going  to  be  to  him,  rather 
than  of  the  inspiration  to  self-activity  he  may  get  out  of  it,  and 
of  the  support  and  honor  which  his  hard  labor  and  serious  study 
may  bring  to  it,  he  is  wanting  in  the  first  and  most  vital  require- 
ments for  admission.  The  services  of  different  men  to  a  pro- 
fession must  be  very  different  in  kind  and  extent,  but  all  may 
bring  it  honor  and  respect;  and  all  who  are  not  anxious  to  do 
that  and  who  will  not  do  valiant  battle  for  it  on  occasion  ought 
to  get  the  benefit  of  a  professional  boot  at  the  point  where  the 
stairway  of  shame  descends  to  a  wide  back  door. 

The  medical  profession  has"  some  special  attributes  which  claim 
particular  reflections.  If  any  men  ought  to  exemplify  and  en- 
force physical,  intellectual  and  moral  cleanliness,  they  are  the 
men  in  the  medical  profession.  They  know  about  aseptic  dress- 
ings, and  they  ought  to  apply  them  to  themselves.  Because  he 
is  chargeable  with  a  knowledge  which  recognizes  filth  at  first 
sight,  and  is  bound  to  stand  for  health,  strength  and  cleanliness 
at  all  times  and  in  all  things,  the  doctor  who  is  weak,  immoral, 
or  unclean  becomes  a  conspicuous  and  contemptible  spectacle 
among  men. 

The  medical  profession  is  in  a  special  sense  a  scientific  pro- 
fession. It  runs  down  to  and  rests  upon  the  fundamental  and 
exact  sciences.  It  applies  them  to  the  highest  interests  of  men. 
There  has  been  too  much  ignorant  and  heartrending  blundering 
in  medical  practice  by  men  who  claimed  an  expert  knowledge 
which  they  did  not  possess.  Experience  has  shown  that  society 


FACTORS    IN  THE    MAKING    OF    THE    MEDICAL   PROFESSION         83 

must  protect  itself.  No  amount  of  scientific  training  can  make 
men  honest:  a  smattering  of  it  seems  to  make  men  dishonest, 
for  it  almost  inevitably  leads  to  false  pretenses.  A  frank  and 
honest  man  with  no  scientific  training  but  a  very  large  practical 
experience  is  a  safer  practitioner  and  a  more  respectable  char- 
acter than  one  who  assumes  to  base  his  treatment  of  injury  and 
disease  upon  a  scientific  knowledge  which  every  true  scientist 
knows  is  halting,  inaccurate,  and  uncertain.  One  without  a 
very  full  knowledge  of  chemistry  and  bacteriology,  and  a  very 
considerable  knowledge  of  physics  and  of  physiology,  zoology, 
histology,  and  embryology,  and  one  without  a  sharp  nose  for 
investigation  and  without  scientific  methods  which  will  reach 
down  to  a  foundation  that  will  stand  and  lead  out  to  conclusions 
that  are  definite  has  no  business  dealing  with  the  serious  problems 
of  human  physical  life. 

Young  man,  you  have  the  fundamentals  of  scientific  knowledge 
and  this  studious  method ;  or,  if  you  have  not,  you  have  it  in  you 
to  get  it ;  or,  if  it  is  not  in  you  to  get  it,  then  you  are  trying  to 
break  into  the  wrong  profession.  And  the  very  least  that  the 
medical  profession  can  ask  and  the  public  can  demand  of  you  is 
that  when  a  sufferer  asks  your  aid  you  shall  with  the  utmost 
pains  and  by  the  fullest  physical  examination  ascertain  what 
the  trouble  is,  if  it  is  in  )iou  to  know,  and  if  it  is  not  that  you  shall 
claim  the  assistance  of  a  true  pathologist  who  can  find  out.  When 
you  know  what  the  matter  is,  you  will  be  more  likely  to  know  what 
to  do  to  take  care  of  it,  and  when  you  do  know,  proceed  with  assid- 
uity and  courage  and  exactness  and  completeness  to  do  it,  or  claim 
the  aid  of  another  who  will.  If  you  do  not  know  and  if  you  can  not 
do,  at  least  spare  people  the  infliction  of  any  unnecessary  lying  about 
it,  or  of  any  treatment  which  may  be  worse  than  the  disease. 

There  is  much  to  tempt  one  into  wrong  in  the  medical  profession. 
The  respect  of  men  and  professional  success  alike  depend  upon  your 
not  giving  way  to  it.  You  will  be  found  out  when  you  do.  The 
judgment  of  a  community  is  intuitive  and  inexorable.  There  are 
fussy  and  fidgety  and  weak-headed  people  who  enjoy  bad  health 
and  will  have  no  physicians  who  do  not  encourage  their  belief 
that  they  must  necessarily  have  it.  And  there  are  physicians  who 
fall  in  with  that  sort  of  thing  for  the  sake  of  the  fees.  But  such 
physicians  have  to  be  content  with  such  patients,  for  other  patients 
do  not  want  them.  And  where  there  is  one  person  of  that  kind 
there  is  an  hundred  of  the  other  kind  who  want  health  and  prefer 
to  employ  an  honest  and  genuine  man  who  will  tell  them  the  truth 
and  help  them  to  have  health.  Of  course,  a  little  harmless  bam- 


84  NEW   YORK   STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

boozling  of  an  heroic  soul  may  be  warranted  in  a  real  exigency  now 
and  then,  but  the  doctor  who  is  fool  enough  to  attempt  to  bamboozle 
the  wrong  man  when  there  is  no  exigency  ought  not  to  complain  if 
he  pays  for  his  mistake  by  the  loss  of  his  job  and  the  destruction 
of  any  reputation  he  may  have.  You  may  possibly  be  forgiven  for 
not  telling  unfortunates  that  they  are  as  sick  as  they  are;  but  if 
you  tell  people  that  they  are  worse  than  they  are,  so  that  if  they  die 
you  will  be  on  the  safe  side,  and  if  in  some  way  they  live  you  will 
get  credit  for  a  miraculous  cure, — your  over  smartness  will  surely 
find  you  out.  If  you  fondle  and  deceive  patients  in  order  to 
enlarge  your  fees  you  will  do  your  patients  a  great  wrong  but  you 
will  do  yourselves  a  greater  wrong  because  while  you  are  doing  it 
you  will  be  polluting  your  own  soul  and  robbing  yourselves  of 
ambitious  and  enlarging  reputations.  It  will  be  much  better  in  the 
long  run  to  keep  in  the  middle  of  the  road  and  in  company  with  the 
truth. 

The  medical  profession  is  a  sympathetic  as  well  as  a  scientific 
profession.  The  very  soul  and  spirit  of  it  must  spring  out  of 
human  sympathy.  As  fine  traditions  as  any  that  have  grown  out 
of  man's  experiences  are  associated  with  the  work  of  the  family 
doctor.  There  is  some  reason  to  fear  that  he  may  be  passing  away. 
The  conditions  of  modern  living,  the  methods  of  modern  business, 
the  vast  extent  of  really  skilled  specialization  in  medical  practice, 
and  the  growth  of  hospitals,  all  tend  to  commercialize  the  medical 
profession.  In  two  great  buildings  directly  opposite  each  other  on 
State  street  in  Chicago  there  are  the  offices  of  a  thousand  doctors. 
They  never  see  the  homes  of  many  of  their  patients,  and  too  many 
of  them  never  see  any  home  life  at  all  for  they  live  in  hotels  and 
boarding  houses  themselves.  They  are  excellent  men  and  they  are 
better  educated  than  doctors  were  in  other  days,  but  they  must  miss 
some  of  the  factors  which  are  needful  to  the  harmonious  evolution 
of  a  true  physician's  life,  because  that  life  relates  to  the  homes  and 
the  family  circumstances  and  relations  of  his  clientele. 

Be  true  to  the  men  and  women  who  employ  you.  Don't  be  gab- 
blers. Keep  their  secrets  and  serve  them  with  undivided  regard  for 
their  interests  rather  than  your  own.  Don't  nurse  jobs  instead  of 
patients.  Do  your  work ;  do  it  thoroughly ;  be  gentle  and  true,  at 
times  resolute  and  decisive;  attend  to  your  business  with  all  the 
expedition  you  have,  and  then  get  out.  It  will  be  infinitely  the 
better  policy. 

It  is  too  bad  that  people  seem  so  unable  to  get  rid  of  a  doctor  who 
has  become  a  piece  of  the  family  bric-a-brac,  when  they  really  want 
to.  The  only  national  society  yet  to  be  organized,  which  I  can 


FACTORS    IN    THE    MAKING    OF    THE    MEDICAL    PROFESSION         85 

think  of,  is  one  which  will  give  the  members  courage  to  get  rid  of 
physicians  of  whom  they  have  tired,  and  who  have  more  nerve  than 
they  have  themselves.  If  one  doesn't  like  a  lawyer  he  goes  to 
another  with  his  next  case,  but  if  he  doesn't  like  his  physician  he 
holds  on  to  him  with  a  sternness  which  philosophy  has  never  ex- 
plained and  experimental  psychology  has  never  yet  solved.  If 
men  and  women  were  not  so  subject  to  claptrap  and  pretense,  they 
would  have  better  health,  pretenders  would  not  be  so  common  nor 
so  persistent,  and  physicians  of  worth  would  be  more  widely  recog- 
nized and  more  uniformly  regarded.  There  is  room  here  for  just 
one  more  philanthropic  national  organization  and  we  ought  all  to 
give  support  to  one  that  would  take  this  good  cause  in  hand. 

It  needs  no  mere  theory  and  no  bare  logic,  to  show  that  science 
and  sympathy  must  go  together  in  the  successful  practice  of  medi- 
cine. The  life  of  every  successful  physician  makes  it  obvious 
enough.  The  lower  ranks  of  the  profession  are  full  of  men  who 
blunder  along  and  hold  on  to  a  weakling  or  an  unfortunate  with 
all  of  the  persistence  which  credulity  permits ;  but  the  upper  ranks 
of  the  profession  hold  the  really  successful  men  in  whom  humane 
sympathy  unites  with  learning  to  develop  the  great  souls  whom 
the  world  recognizes  on  the  instant  and  for  whom  it  is  always 
eager  to  remove  its  hat.  The  men  who  are  capable  of  service  and 
who  are  anxious  to  serve  are  the  only  men  worthy  of  recognition 
in  the  medical  profession. 

Help  the  poor.  Do  not  be  imposed  upon,  but  do  not  withhold 
service  because  one  can  not  pay.  It  is  not  the  function  of  the  medical 
profession  to  regulate  fees.  Do  all  the  work  you  can  get  for  what- 
ever you  can  get  and  do  it  just  as  loyally  as  you  can,  whatever  the 
pay.  It  is  about  all  you  will  be  good  for  for  a  dozen  years.  You 
won't  be  entitled  to  dictate  terms  for  a  good  while.  If  you  accept 
this  theory  you  will  soon  have  work,  you  will  grow  in  skill  and 
in  repute,  and  you  will  in  time  be  able  to  dictate  terms.  Don't 
expect  to  gain  the  position  of  an  eminent  physician  or  surgeon 
without  going  through  the  long,  many,  hard  years  of  service  and 
of  anxiety  that  that  man  has  bravely,  studiously  and  generously 
given  to  gain  learning,  skill,  eminence  and  respect. 

And  all  of  us  have  some  sort  of  a  claim  upon  the  most  eminent 
and  successful  medical  men,  and  the  quaities  that  have  made  those 
men  successful  lead  them  to  respect  it.  One  who  has  served  who- 
ever called,  for  small  fees  or  no  fees,  at  all  times  of  day  or  night, 
and  has  come  to  the  time  when  he  can  do  it  no  longer  and  must  of 
necessity  discriminate  and  may  in  a  way  fix  his  own  terms,  may  no 
longer  be  bound  to  respond  to  every  call ;  but  he  is  bound  to  have 


86  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

young  men  around  him  who  will,  and  to  keep  them  under  his  guid- 
ance, and  to  go  himself  when  the  exigency  demands  it. 

If  I  can  not  afford  to  pay  the  Dean  of  this  medical  college  for 
attending  me  in  my  distresses  and  am  obliged  to  take  up  with  one 
so  inexperienced  as  you,  I  am  at  least  entitled  to  have"  Dr  Ward 
come  in  and  see  me  before  you  let  me  die  without  any  reason,  and 
have  him  tell  you  in  my  presence  how  well  you  have  been  doing, — 
and  then  take  you  out  in  the  other  room  and  tell  you  to  stop  and 
do  something  else. 

They  tell  a  story  of  my  friend,  Dr  Newell  Dwight  Hillis  of 
Plymouth  Church,  that  I  do  not  vouch  for  but  that  may  easily  be 
true.  The  story  is  that  when  Dr  Hillis  was  serving  a  small  church 
in  Evanston,  Mrs  Hillis  being  desperately  sick  the  young  preacher 
called  an  eminent  specialist.Dr  John  C.  Webster,  of  Chicago,  whose 
ministrations  were  completely  successful.  Dr  Hillis  worried  about 
the  bill  and  after  a  little  went  over  and  said,  "  Dr  Webster,  I  can 
not  pay  you  at  once  but  I  want  to  know  what  your  bill  is  and  I  will 
soon  arrange  it.  Here  is  $50.  It  is  all  that  I  can  pay  now.  Money 
can  never  discharge  my  debt  for  such  eminent  services  as  yours. 
If  you  will  tell  me  the  amount  of  your  bill  so  that  I  may  have  it  in 
mind  I  will  pay  it  in  full  just  as  soon  as  I  can."  Dr  Webster 
replied,  "  You  keep  your  money.  I  owe  you  as  much  as  you  do  me 
and  doubtless  I  shall  need  you  as  much  as  you  will  need  me.  You 
have  made  as  good  in  theology  as  I  have  in  medicine.  I  would  like 
to  exchange  works  with  you.  I  will  keep  Mrs  Hillis  out  of  Heaven 
as  long  as  I  can,  if  you  will  keep  me  out  of  Hell  as  long  as  you  can.'' 
I  can  not  hope  to  get  in  the  high  station  of  Dr  Hillis  but  I  submit 
that  I  ought  not  to  be  compelled  to  forego  the  services  of  the  Dean 
of  the  Medical  College  on  an  exceptional  occasion  only  because  he 
may  stand  in  need  of  more  theology  than  I  am  able  to  provide. 

The  medical  profession  is  bound  to  be  more  than  clean  and  pure 
and  square,  more  than  scientific,  and  more  than  sympathetic.  It 
must  be  steady,  cheerful,  courageous,  optimistic  and  confident.  It 
is  bound  to  put  courage  into  people  to  the  end  that  doctor  and 
patient  may  work  together  in  meeting  exigencies  and  finding  the 
way  back  to  normal  health.  Half  the  worth  of  half  the  doctors  is 
in  their  buoyant  and  bracing  temperaments. 

The  medical  profession  is  more  than  all  that :  it  is  a  patriotic  pro- 
fession. It  is  expert  upon  the  principles  which  the  state  must 
observe  to  be  healthful,  and  concerning  the  practices  which  society 
must  prevent  if  we  are  to  live  in  crowded  settlements  with  any 
degree  of  comfort  and  safety.  We  look  to  this  profession  to  set  up 
the  machinery  which  may  assure  the  common  heilth  and  to  provide 


FACTORS    IN    THE    MAKING    OF    THE    MEDICAL    PROFESSION         87 

schools,  laboratories  and  hospitals,  always  expensive,  which  will 
make  modern  scientific  knowledge  available  to  the  mass  and  meet 
the  needs  of  the  many  who  must  inevitably  be  overtaken  by  acci- 
dent and  disease  under  the  swiftly  moving  and  dangerous  conditions 
of  our  complex  life. 

You  are  entering  an  ancient,  a  learned  and  an  honorable  profes- 
sion. It  is  a  profession  which  lays  equal  claim  upon  the  funda- 
mental sciences  and  the  manly  virtues.  It  is  distinguished  by  the 
fact  that  it  is  itself  largely  responsible  for  the  marvelous  scientific 
advance  of  the  last  generation.  It  is  filled  with  sympathy  and  gener- 
osity. It  is  a  courageous  and  patriotic  profession.  It  attracts 
scoundrels  and  is  often  used  to  shelter  meanness  and  vice.  It  is 
a  laborious  profession.  You  will  have  to  earn  your  bread  in  the 
sweat  of  your  brows  and  you  will  have  to  win  any  fame  you  get  by 
a  nobility  of  purpose  that  will  stand  all  tests,  by  study  which  will 
keep  you  at  the  front  of  the  scientific  advance,  and  by  zeal  for  service 
which  always  opens  the  door  of  opportunity.  You  have  just  as  high 
rights  as  any  body.  Do  not  fear.  Take  your  self-confidence  in 
your  hand.  The  outcome  is  with  you.  You  will  have  to  elect  and 
you  will  do  it  soon.  You  will  stumble  along  in  uncertainty,  think- 
ing much  of  yourself,  wondering  why  you  are  not  appreciated,  and 
soon  coming  to  mediocrity  out  of  which  you  can  never  rise ;  or  you 
will  at  once  give  yourselves  up  to  a  splendid  service  and  in  time 
bring  honor  to  a  great  profession.  No  one  is  going  to  plead  with 
you  or  stay  with  you  forever  to  get  you  to  do  it.  If  you  haven't  got 
fiber  and  force  enough  to  move  out  and  up  on  your  own  account, 
there  are  plenty  of  others  who  have.  And  they  are  the  ones  who  are 
entitled  to  the  world's  best  help  because  they  have  got  it  in  them 
to  help  the  world. 


ABSTRACT   OF   REMARKS   AT   NEW    YORK   STATE 
GRANGE,  1906,  AT  GENEVA,  N.  Y. 

More  than  seventy  per  cent  of  the  people  of  this  State  are  living 
in  cities.  New  York  city  is  doubling  in  size  in  thirty  years.  This 
means  that  city  interests  and  theories  are  likely  to  predominate  in 
the  political,  social,  religious  and  industrial  life  of  the  State.  Then 
farmers  will  have  to  readjust  themselves. 

Our  State  agriculture  is  waking  up.  The  splendid  advance  in 
dairying,  in  truck  farming — particularly  on  Long  Island,  in  fruit 
culture — particularly  in  western  New  York,  in  flowers  and  orna- 
mental plants,  and  in  the  canning  of  fruits  and  vegetables,  is  all  very 
encouraging.  But  agriculture  does  not  wake  up  as  fast  as  the  other 
businesses  of  the  State. 

We  have  a  State  that  can  do  anything.  There  is  no  good  rea- 
son why  the  New  York  farmers  should  let  the  western  farmers 
carry  much  more  than  corn  and  wheat  past  their  doors  to  the  great 
eastern  markets.  Wrhy  do  we  not  raise  more  beef  cattle,  more 
draft  horses,  more  sheep  and  more  swine  for  New  York,  Phila- 
delphia and  Boston  and  for  Europe?  If  it  is  said  that  it  is  because 
of  lack  of  feed,  it  may  be  answered  that  the  State  can  raise  any- 
thing. The  fault  is  not  so  much  with  the  farms  as  with  the 
farmers.  If  the  farmers  do  not  know  how  to  do  it,  the  Agri- 
cultural Experiment  Station  and  the  Agricultural  College  must  tell 
them. 

What  is  needed  is  farming  on  a  larger  scale,  a  better  chemi- 
cal knowledge  of  the  soils  and  a  closer  adaptation  of  crops  to 
soils,  a  better  understanding  of  the  demands  of  the  markets,  good 
relations  with  the  railroads,  and  more  courage.  The  Agricultural 
Experiment  Stations  serve  every  farmer  in  the  Mississippi  valley. 
There  is  none  in  the  country  better  than  the  one  here  in  Geneva. 
It  is  anxious  to  serve.  The  only  uncertainty  is  about  the  anxiety 
of  the  farmers  to  make  use  of  it. 

Farming,  the  success  or  failure  of  it,  has  much  to  do  with  the 
farmer,  with  the  manner  of  his  life  and  that  of  his  wife  and 
children,  with  his  intelligence,  and  with  his  happiness.  If  New 
York  farmers  can  make  more  money  they  will  have  better  schools. 
With  railroads,  and  trolleys,  and  telephones,  and  newspapers,  and 
the  daily  free  delivery  of  mails,  the  farmers  ought  to  have  better 
homes  and  quite  as  good  schools  as  the  people  in  the  cities 

88 


REMARKS    AT    NEW    YORK    STATE    GRANGE,    1906,    GENEVA   N.    Y.       89 

* 

have.  There  must  be  not  only  a  good  elementary  school  within 
walking  distance  of  every  farmhouse,  but  a  good  high  school  within 
easy  driving  distance  of  it.  The  little  roadside  schools  must  be 
connected  with  village  high  schools.  The  supervisory  district  must 
be  so  small  that  a  superintendent  can  visit  each  country  school 
once  a  month  and  that  the  teachers  can  all  come  together  for  in- 
struction as  often. 

All  the  people  of  the  State  are  to  live  together.  We  are  to  live 
and  help  live.  Every  resident  of  New  York  city  has  interest  in 
the  prosperity  of  every  New  York  farmer.  The  reverse  should  be 
true  also.  Farmers  must  dispel  prejudices  and  get  rid  of  old  routine 
that  does  not  fit  new  conditions.  Cooperation,  not  criticism,  is 
the  essence  of  modern  success.  There  is  no  greater  State  in  the 
Union.  .  Look  at  her  history,  her  splendid  commercial  situation, 
her  wealth  and  her  opportunities.  Let  all  the  people  work  together 
to  make  the  most  of  these  things.  Those  who  do  will  make  most 
headway  for  themselves. 


THE  TREND  IN  AMERICAN  EDUCATION 

Reprinted  from  Appleton's  magazine  by  courtesy  of  Messrs    D.  Appleton 

&  Co. 

Americans  are  ever  ready  to  try  out  new  propositions.  Not 
many  Americans  are  very  discriminating  about  projects.  The 
spirit  of  the  country  is  not  satisfied  until  suggestions  have  been 
put  to  the  practical  test.  If  individual  and  personal  initiative  is 
needed,  any  number  of  people  will  supply  it;  if  public  action  is 
necessary,  nearly  everybody  will  support  it.  As  individuals,  and 
even  more  as  a  people,  we  are  bound  to  get  all  of  the  possibilities 
out  of  all  the  things  we  chance  to  think  of.  Our  native  energy 
and  common  optimism  are  ever  disposed  to  experiment,  and  our 
free-flowing  democracy  and  our  much  legislation  make  it  easy 
enough  to  do  so.  If  something  results  we  are  very  happy  for  we 
have  made  an  addition  tOL  our  already  very  good  collection  of 
national  assets;  if  nothing  results  there  is  no  harm — we  have  had 
the  fun  which  we  get  out  of  experimenting,  and  the  laugh  which 
we  associate  with  failure.  It  all  stimulates  productivity.  It  puts 
a  premium  upon  the  novel;  but  it  makes  headway  and  brings  out 
great  results.  Our  energy  and  our  optimism  are  valuable  national 
properties.  They  lead  us  into  some  passing  blunders,  but  they 
give  us  many  enduring  results. 

It  is  strikingly  so  in  matters  educational.  It  is  the  intention  of 
the  people  who  control  the  destiny  of  the"  United  States  to  do  every- 
thing, to  try  out  every  manner  of  experiment,  which  may  raise  the 
common  level  of  intelligence  and  enlarge  the  opportunity  of  the 
boy  or  girl,  the  man  or  woman,  in  the  crowd.  It  comes  pretty 
near  being  the  national  religion.  It  leads  to  some  incidental 
absurdities,  but  to  more  very  striking  and  permanent  advances. 

There  is  apparently  some  growing  doubt  in  the  land  about  all 
men  being  created  equal.  There  is  even  some  skepticism  about 
the  laws  being  wholly  without  favor,  or  at  least  about  their  being 
administered  so  that  the  rights  of  all  are  exactly  alike ;  but  there  is 
no  doubt  whatever  of  the  common  determination  that  every 
American  boy  or  girl  shall  have  his  or  her  full  opportunity  through 
an  absolute  equality  of  right  to  an  education.  That,  at  least,  has 
by  the  common  impulse  become  the  first  law  of  our  land.  The 
sense  of  proprietorship  in  the  educational  system  is  universal,  and 
the  purpose  to  make  that  system  the  widest  and  the  best  in  the 
world  is  not  at  all  obscure. 

9° 


THE  TREND  IN  AMERICAN  EDUCATION  QI 

The  early  thought  of  the  nation  about  education — the  thought 
which  our  English  forefathers  brought  from  over  the  sea — has 
completely  changed.  It  is  not  something  good  which  government  is 
to  encourage,  but  something  vital  which  government  must  provide. 
And  the  government  which  is  to  provide  it  must  of  necessity  be 
sovereign  as  well  as  local  and  administrative.  The  educational 
system  is  no  longer  a  system  which  shall  supply  the  elements  of 
knowledge  or  the  primary  instruments  for  gaining  knowledge, 
but  a  system  which  is  expected  to  supply  all  the  knowledge  which 
any  son  or  daughter  of  the  State  has  the  preparation  and  the  will 
to  come  and  take.  It  no  longer  acts  through  schools  alone,  but 
through  libraries,  museums,  clubs,  lectures,  publications, -and  all 
other  instrumentalities  which  may  po'ssibly  raise  the  level  of  the 
intellectual  plane. 

And  when  so  much  in  every  direction  is  being  attempted  at 
public  expense,  through  officials  who  are  not  always  experienced 
and  who  get  no  credit  for  being  conservative,  there  must  be  a  good 
deal  of  commotion  much  of  the  time,  and  no  little  uncertainty 
about  the  net  results. 

Teachers  and  other  professional  managers  naturally  respond  to 
the  popular  impulse ;  not  a  few  of  them  capitalize  it.  When  the 
vox  populi  uniformly  sounds  an  advance,  when  the  educational 
associations  are  ravenous  for  something  new  to  discuss,  when  the 
daily  newspapers  discriminate  in  favor  of  things  that  are  novel, 
when  celebrity  is  dependent  upon  proposing  something  out  of  the 
ordinary,  teachers,  like  other  classes  of  our  resourceful  fellow 
countrymen,  are  not  likely  to  be  weighed  in  the  balance  and  found 
wanting.  And  it  must  be  admitted  that  they  enjoy  it.  Even  if 
discussion  and  agitation  do  not  bring  forth  results  that  are  lasting, 
they  supply  the  intellectual  pastime  which  teachers  sorely  need. 

But  propositions  and  projects  are  not  tendencies.  Even  dis- 
cussions which  entertain  for  an  interminable  time  and  movements 
which  take  forever  to  come  to  something  or  nothing,  are  not  trends, 
but  only  persistencies,  in  education.  The  national  character  goes 
on  unfolding  in  its  own  exclusive  and  imperial  way.  It  adopts 
and  adapts  what  can  enlarge  and  enrich  the  soul  of  the  Republic: 
all  the  rest  comes  to  naught.  American  education  accepts  and 
incorporates  what  can  add  to  the  intellectual  stores,  the  mental 
culture,  the  philosophical  sense,  and  the  industrial  productivity 
of  a  free  people ;  the  rest  is  forgotten. 

One  can  not  traverse  the  last  twenty-five  years  of  American 
educational  progress  without  seeing  many  developments  which 
are  so  substantial  and  decisive,  and  withal  so  completely  accom- 


92  NEW    YORK    STATE    EDUCATION    DEPARTMENT 

plished,  that  they  must  have  become  permanent.  That  period  has 
been  marked  by  truly  marvelous  advances,  not  only  in  the  pro- 
fessional but  in  the  common  thought  of  the  nation.  It  i*  not  too 
much  to  say  that  no  such  educational  advance  has  been  made  in 
all  the  other  history  of  democratic  government  and  of  the  English- 
speaking  race.  So  rapidly  and  confidently  has  universal  education 
moved  in  this  country  and  in  our  generation  that  the  outlines  of 
the  national  educational  system  of  the  future  begin  to  appear. 

A  very  distinct  differentiation  of  the  schools  into  elementary, 
secondary  and  higher  grades,  for  the  purpose  of  administration, 
is  going  forward.  The  professional  mind  is  making  it  and  the  lay 
mind  is  accepting  it.  It  is  advantageous  to  each  grade  of  schools 
because  it  puts  each  upon  its  own  ground  and  holds  each  to  its  own 
responsibilities.  It  makes  educational  values  more  stable  and 
constant,  and  it  fixes  standards  capable  of  wider  use.  It  discredits 
pretenders  and  helps  to  clear  away  popular  confusion. 

In  the  last  thirty  or  thirty-five  years  the  system  of  collegiate 
schools  has  advanced  in  numbers,  in  character,  in  attendance,  in 
the  multiplicity  of  offerings,  and  in  the  measure  of  public  support 
and  popular  interest,  to  an  extent  which  is  alike  surprising  and 
gratifying  to  educationists.  The  college  system  is  giving  far  more 
uplift  and  direction  to  all  schools  than  the  people  realize.  True 
as  to  all  parts  of  the  country,  this  is  most  emphatically  true  in  the 
newer  parts  where  democracy  has  little  to  hamper  it,  where  new 
institutions  have  not  come  into  conflict  with  older  ones  which  had 
pretty  good  rights  to  the  ground  and  could  neither  give  way  nor 
easily  change  in  character,  theory,  spirit,  relations,  or  outlook. 
The  sure  trend  of  our  educational  system  is  certainly  more  clearly 
apparent  in  the  newer  states  where  both  the  national  and  state 
governments  have  freedom  and  disposition  to  cooperate  with  ex- 
ceedingly ambitious  people  who  are  setting  up  new  institutions. 
It  is  particularly  true  concerning  institutions  of  advanced  grade 
which  are  providing  a  general  rather  than  a  local  service. 

Of  course  no  unfavorable  implications  are  cast  upon  the  eastern 
and  older  colleges.  Indeed,  it  is  doubtless  true  that  some  of  them 
are  entitled  to  more  credit  for  having  broken  away  from  educa- 
tionally hide-bound  constituencies  and  supposedly  settled  theories, 
for  having  accepted  the  guidance  of  liberal  and  masterful  leaders, 
and  for  having  possessed  the  courage  and  asserted  the  freedom 
necessary  to  wider  service,  than  the  western  pioneers — with  a 
necessarily  wider  because  a  later  outlook  and  with  less  hindrances 
than  the  eastern  pioneers — are  for  drawing  upon  the  world's  later 
experiences  and  making  at  first  hand,  controlling,  supporting  and 


THE  TREND  IN  AMERICAN  EDUCATION  93 

shaping  to  their  own  ends  what  the  country  most  needs  in  the  way 
of  both  upper  and  lower  schools. 

Any  substantial  uplift  in  a  system  of  education  must  come  from 
above.  Any  great  improvement  or  advance  in"  a  class  of  schools 
must  come  from  a  class  of  schools  higher  up.  This  fact  is  now 
actually  coming  to  be  recognized  by  the  lower  schools  themselves 
in  America,  and  that  of  itself  is  giving  unwonted  trend  and  charac- 
ter to  the  national  school  system.  But  it  necessarily  follows  that 
the  factors  which  enter  into  the  scheme  and  give  turns  to  the  plans 
of  the  upper  schools  exert  a  very  strong  influence  upon  the  Icind 
of  uplift  and  the  direction  of  the  development  which  those  schools 
give  to  the  middle  and  lower  schools. 

In  the  older  states  three  or  four  of  the  better  colleges  of  our 
fathers  have  in  the  last  generation  developed  into  leading  univer- 
sities with  most  of  the  faculties  which  educational  traditions  and 
modern  philosophical  and  material  development  make  needful. 
In  the  meantime  the  other  earlier  colleges  are  getting  their  ratings 
and  finding  their  real  work  in  a  somewhat  exclusive  field,  but 
finding  new  satisfaction  in  occupying  that  field  with  added  useful- 
ness and  honor.  And  many  new  institutions  have  been  established, 
to  fall  into  one  class  or  another  of  the  higher  institutions.  The 
stronger  of  these  institutions  in  a  very  great  measure,  and  the 
others  in  some  measure,  are  giving  tone  and  breadth  to  our  national 
scholarship.  But  on  the  whole  it  must  be  said  that  they  are  doing 
this  through  their  graduates,  through  our  professional  and  business 
affairs,  through  the  teachers  they  have  trained  for  other  colleges 
and  universities,  rather  than  through  any  very  direct  bearing 
which  they  have  had  upon  the  lower  schools.  They  have  sustained 
no  organic,  nor  indeed  any  very  sympathetic,  connection  with 
lower  schools  and  their  main  influence  upon  the  middle  schools  has 
had  reference  to  getting  students  for  themselves  and  to  having 
them  prepared  to  meet  their-  own  circumstances  and  their  particu- 
lar demands.  Not  more  than  two  or  three  of  the  older  universities, 
of  which  Harvard  and  Columbia  are  conspicuous  examples,  have 
provided  substantial  offerings  in  educational  science  and  adminis- 
tration, or  really  undertaken  in  a  rational  way  to  study,  to  train 
teachers  for,  or  to  give  energy  and  direction  to  the  schools  below 
them.  With  these  very  rare  exceptions,  the  older  universities  and 
colleges  have  given  only  very  indirect  and  disjointed,  and  often 
very  self-interested,  aid  to  the  -primary  and  secondary  school 
systems  which  have  been  maturing  very  rapidly  and  substantially 
all  around  them. 

In  all  states  west  of  New  York  and  Pennsylvania,  and  in  many 


94  NEW  YORK  STATE  EDUCATION  DEPARTMENT 

of  the  southern  states,  a  distinctly  new  class  of  advanced  institu- 
tions has  grown  up.  In  many  cases  they  came  into  being  before 
the  Civil  War,  and  often  they  were  established  and  provided  with 
revenues  by  the  state  Constitutions.  In  several  instances  the 
state  universities  already  established  were  given  the  federal  grants 
of  common  lands  and  public  moneys  for  research;  in  other  cases 
these  grants  resulted  in  new  institutions  of  the  more  distinctly 
agricultural  and  mechanical  type.  With  or  without  this  aid,  the 
state  universities  began  to  enlist  the  enthusiastic  interest  and 
financial  support  of  the  people  of  their  states  in  the  seventies  and 
eighties,  which  became  even  more  decisive  in  the  nineties,  and  has 
now  gone  so  far  as  to  completely  assure  not  only  their  continuance 
but  their  continually  enlarging  and  absolutely  decisive  influence 
upon  all  of  the  educational  activities  of  their  states. 

If  we  were  to  name  twenty  of  the  largest  American  universities, 
counting  by  buildings,  equipment,  faculties,  revenues,  offerings, 
libraries  and  attendance,  fully  fifteen  of  them  would  be  state 
universities.  Several  of  these  have  faculties  numbering  from  three 
hundred  to  five  hundred  teachers,  representing  every  culturing, 
professional,  philosophical  and  industrial  interest  of  our  widely 
diversified  modern  education;  and  their  student  bodies  often  include 
from  three  thousand  to  five  thousand  people.  Their  assured  sup- 
port in  popular  sympathy  and  public  money  is  alike  munificent 
and  magnificent.  Several  have  conferred  more  than  a  thousand 
degrees  each  at  their  recent  June  commencements.  Their  gradu- 
ates are  of  course  most  numerous  in  their  own  states,  but  they  are 
not  unknown  in  any  part  of  the  country,  nor  indeed  in  any  part  of 
any  country  where  something  worth  while  is  going  on. 

The  influence  of  Columbia  and  Harvard  and  Yale  and  some 
others  upon  these  western  universities  will  always  be  gratefully 
admitted,  but  that  should  not  disguise  the  fact  that  they  have 
individuality,  purpose  and  outlook  very  thoroughly  their  own. 
Refraining  from  comparisons — as  idle  as  odious — it  is  moderate  to 
say  that  in  ambition  and  energy,  in  the  variety  of  their  work  and 
the  plane  of  their  standards,  in  the  seriousness  and  the  democratic 
resourcefulness  of  their  students  and  the  steadily  augmenting 
power  of  their  graduates,  and  particularly  in  what  they  are  doing 
for  the  industrial  development  and  the  sane  thinking  of  the  coun- 
try, they  have  come  to  give  a  decisive  trend  to  the  future  of  Ameri- 
can education. 

To  bring  out  the  special  bearing  of  this  work,  under  the  particu- 
lar environing  influences,  on  literary  culture,  on  the  political 
sciences,  on  scientific  research,  on  law,  medicine  and  architecture, 


THE  TREND  IN  AMERICAN  EDUCATION  95 

on  all  lines  of  engineering,  and  upon  the  constructive  and  agricul- 
tural industries,  very  much  might  be  justly  said.  But  we  must 
now  be  content  with  briefly  pointing  out  its  relations  to  the  middle 
and  the  lower  schools. 

In  all  parts  of  the  country  the  secondary  schools  have  become 
an  integral  part  of  the  public  educational  system.  In  all  of  the 
Central,  Rocky  Mountain,  and  Pacific  states  the  universities  have 
also  become  a  part  of  that  system.  In  the  East  the  public  school 
system  has  twelve  grades ;  in  the  West  it  has  sixteen.  The  extent 
to  which  the  university  has  become  a  part  of  the  common  school 
system  may  be  seen  from  the  following  bare  statements:  (a)  It 
lays  out  the  courses  for  the  high  schools.  (6)  It  supplies  a  very 
considerable  part  of  the  high  school  teachers,  (c)  It  inspects  the 
high  schools  regularly  by  its  own  officer,  (d)  It  admits  students 
to  the  university  without  examination,  from  approved  high  schools, 
and  under  the  stimulus  of  popular  demand  all  of  the  high  schools 
must  become  worthy  of  approval,  (e)  The  university  takes  a 
keen  interest  in  elementary  school  questions  and  is  an  ever  present 
influence  in  the  teachers  associations.  (/)  It  makes  the  common 
schools  the  laboratories  of  its  education  department,  (g)  It  re- 
sponds to  all  popular  demands  and  becomes  a  potent  factor  in 
determining  educational  legislation  and  shaping  educational  policy. 
(h)  It  is  free  and  all  ambitious  eyes  are  turned  toward  it;  it  is 
popular  and  all  boys  and  girls  in  the  high  schools  think  about 
going  to  it.  (i)  It  naturally  comes  to  be  looked  upon  as  belong- 
ing to  all  the  people  and  as  the  responsible  head  and  guide  of  the 
public  educational  system. 

Of  course,  this  affects  the  university  itself  as  much  as  the  rest 
of  the  system,  and  again  of  course,  it  brings  out  a  university  suited 
to  the  needs  of  a  busy,  prosperous  and  ambitious  people,  who  want 
the  best  in  the  world  educationally  and  are  determined  to  make 
very  free  use  of  their  power  to  have -it.  In  other  words,  it  is  bring- 
ing out  in  our  states  a  new  style  of  university  which  is  already 
giving  decisive  trend  to  the  national  system  of  education.  And  a 
process  which  has  gone  so  far  in  all  the  states  save  a  half  dozen 
seems  likely  to  be  adopted  in  every  state  where  existing  universi- 
ties do  not  meet  every  need  at  a  nominal  cost.  In  newer  and  older 
states  it  is  sure  to  become  yet  more  decisive  in  its  influence. 

Again  let  it  be  said  that  in  all  this  there  is  no  element  of  implica- 
tion against  the  older  universities  or  the  literary  colleges,  which 
find  all  the  work  which  they  can  do  thoroughly  and  well.  In- 
heriting much  from  European  thought  and  forms,  shaped  by 
American  conditions  when  classical  training  was  the  sum  and 


96  NEW  YORK  STATE    EDUCATION  DEPARTMENT 

professional  employments  the  goal  of  college  work,  they^have 
aided  and  been  themselves  influenced  by  the  development  of  a 
distinctly  new  class  of  institutions  of  higher  learning,  which  have 
been  obliged  by  the  democratic  advance  in  political  science  and 
industrial  prosperity  to  defy  both  English  and  German  models, 
train  for  both  scholarship  and  character,  and  provide  practically 
free  instruction  in  any  study  to  any  qualified  person. 

If  one  will  realize  that  this  great  and  popular  university  develop- 
ment within  the  public  educational  system  is  universal  in  the 
states  which  embrace  the  centers  of  population,  of  industrial  pro- 
ductivity, and  of  political  control  in  our  country,  one  will  be  able 
to  appreciate  something  of  the  overwhelming  trend  which  it  is 
giving  to  our  education.  There  is  nothing  like  it  anywhere  in  the 
world,  for  there  are  no  other  political  institutions  which  must  give 
every  one  his  chance;  there  is  no  other  nation  which  realizes  so 
keenly  that  its  true  greatness  depends  upon  making  the  most  of 
every  individual  unit,  without  regard  to  sex,  or  circumstances  of 
birth,  or  church  associations;  and  there  is  no  other  people  with 
whom  education  comes  so  near  being  an  absolute  and  universal 
passion. 

Passing  now  from  what  seems  to  be  the  overwhelming  trend  in 
our  comprehensive  system  of  education,  namely  the  development 
and  diffusion  of  the  higher  learning  as  an  integral  part  of  the  system 
of  common  schools,  let  us  inquire  about  the  more  specific  results 
of  this  and  some  associate  influences  which  are  operating  in  our 
intellectual  affairs. 

Our  entire  system  of  schools,  higher  and  lower,  is  moving  toward 
resourcefulness,  to  the  training  which  fits  one  for  successful  living 
in  our  complex  civilization.  The  mere  rudiments  which  enable 
a  child  to  read  and  write  are  far  from  sufficient  in  the  elementary 
schools,  and  the  linguistic  studies  which  are  merely  culturing,  in  the 
old  sense  of  the  term,  are  no  longer  in  the  highest  favor  in  the 
advanced  schools.  The  early  ideals  are  passing  away.  The  little 
child  must  be  trained  to  see,  to  think,  to  do,  and  to  express  him- 
self; the  college  student  must  get  the  knowledge,  the  purpose,  the 
power,  the  steadiness,  and  the  endurance  which  accomplish  sub- 
stantial results,  through  mental  or  manual  labor.  Culture  which 
gains  recognition  in  this  country  must  be  more  than  skin-deep  and 
must  come  from  the  reactionary  discipline  of  work  upon  the  work- 
man. 

The  trend  of  our  higher  education,  up  to  the  present  generation, 
was  toward  respectable  polish  for  the  idle  rich,  and  toward  some 
preparation  for  the  learned  professions.  The  trend  of  our  higher 


THE  TREND  IN  AMERICAN  EDUCATION  97 

education  now  is  toward  a  much  better  preparation  for  the  pro- 
fessions and  toward  very  complete  preparation  for  all  of  the  skilled 
employments,  all  of  the  constructive  industries,  and  all  of  the  com- 
mercial activities. 

The  more  complete  preparation  for  the  professions  has  arisen 
from  within  the  professions  themselves  and  has  resulted  very 
largely  from  legislation  limiting  admissions  to  the  professions.  It 
is  but  just  to  say  that  in  this  the  State  of  New  York  has  been  fore- 
most. In  requiring  (a)  four  years'  satisfactory  work  in  an  approved 
school  of  academic  grade;  (b)  four  years'  satisfactory  work  in  an 
approved  professional  school,  with  the  bachelor's  degree  from  an 
institution  duly  empowered  to  confer  it,  as  conditions  for  admis- 
sion to  the  State  licensing  examination,  and  (c)  in  sharply  limiting 
the  use  of  the  terms  college  and  university,  New  York  has  given 
real  trend  to  professional  education  and  professional  standards, 
which  many  of  the  states  about  her  are  happily  beginning  to 
adopt. 

In  this  connection  it  would  be  a  mistake  to  omit  mention  of  the 
decisive  tendency  to  prepare  for  the  professions  in  professional 
schools  which  are  associated  with  the  universities,  rather  than  in 
offices  or  in  independent  institutions.  This  has  led  many  inde- 
pendent professional  schools  to  seek  alliances  with  universities. 
It  is  surely  making  both  the  preliminary  and  professional  training 
much  stronger  and  it  is  leading  a  much  larger  number  of  students 
to  more  thorough  training  than  they  would  otherwise  get.  When 
we  recall  how  recently  there  was  little  preparation,  either  scholastic 
or  technical,  for  the  professions  in  America,  and  how  superficial 
much  of  the  training  in  independent  schools  by  lecturers  who  were 
carrying  on  regular  practice  has  been,  we  have  special  satisfaction 
in  realizing  the  extent  and  excellence  of  the  work  which  the  univer- 
sities are  now  doing  for  professional  learning  and  expertness  in 
America. 

The  aggressive  work  of  the  universities,  other  than  that  which 
is  in  preparation  for  the  learned  professions,  has  come  to  be  in  the 
courses  which  are  fundamental  in  administration  and  in  the  most 
successful  carrying  on  of  the  commercial  activities  and  the  con- 
structive and  manufacturing  industries.  There  is  large  demand 
for  training  in  the  chemistry  which  enters  into  agricultural  and 
manufacturing  activities,  in  all  lines  of  engineering,  in  the  econom- 
ics of  productivity  and  trade,  and  in  the  technic  of  all  the  businesses 
which  follow  after  them.  There  is  more  demand  also  for  the 
basic  work  of  the  political  sciences.  The  demand  is  the  largest 
where  the  equipment  and  teaching  are  the  best.  Of  course  this 


98  NEW  YORK  STATE  EDUCATION  DEPARTMENT 

all  relates  back  to  and  shapes  the  courses  in  the  high  schools,  and 
in  some  measure  in  the  elementary  schools. 

It  is  doing  more  than  causing  the  lower  schools  to  prepare  stu- 
dents for  the  higher  schools.  It  is  developing  a  rather  common 
belief  in  the  crowd  that  a  university  which  does  little  besides  berate 
the  lower  schools  about  suitably  training  students  for  itself,  is  not 
doing  overmuch  for  education;  that  young  people  must  be  trained 
for  subordinate  places  in  business  and  for  manual  skill  in  the  trades 
as  well  as  for  the  colleges  and  for  positions  claiming  deep  scientific 
knowledge;  that  the  high  schools  have  not  yet  accomplished  all 
they  ought  *in  this  direction,  and  that  there  is  "something  lacking 
in  the  way  of  training  the  masses  of  children  in  the  elementary 
schools  for  efficiency  and  contentment  in  the  situations  in  life 
which  they  are  likely  to  occupy;  that  something  in  the  way  of 
public  trade  schools  must  be  established  for  the  children  of  the 
masses  at  a  rather  early  age,  and  that  the  universities  and  colleges 
are  called  upon  to  recognize  that  fact  and  help  realize  it.  In  a 
word,  the  very  development  of  the  higher  learning  is  creating  the 
common  thought  that  more  must  be  done  for  the  elementary 
learning,  that  not  so  much  is  being  done  for  those  who  do  not  go  to 
college  as  for  those  who  do,  and  that  more  must  be  done  to  adapt 
the  training  of  the  masses  to  probable  environment  and  to  the 
inevitable  conditions  of  hand  labor  and  other  self-respecting  and 
useful  employments. 

One  of  the  most  gratifying  developments  of  recent  years  in 
School  administration  relates  not  more  to  the  better  understand- 
ings and  the  warmer  friendships  between  schools  of  different 
grades  than  between  public  and  private  schools,  and  between 
schools  in  one  section  of  the  country  with  those  in  another.  Presi- 
dents and  principals  and  superintendents  and  teachers  are  begin- 
ning to  learn  that  one  gets  rich  in  education  not  by  withholding 
but  by  giving,  and  that  prosperity  attends  an  institution  which 
knows  enough  to  adhere  to  its  own  business  when  it  ought  and  to 
aid  other  institutions  when  it  may.  This  knowledge  is  propa- 
gating deeper  mutual  respect  and  closer  fraternal  regard.  Coopera- 
tion, rather  than  competition,  is  coming  to  be  the  policy  of  the 
schools. 

This  growing  disposition  toward  mutual  helpfulness  recognizes 
no  state  lines  or  other  political  boundaries.  It  is  indifferent  to 
provincialism,  to  sectarianism,  to  politics,  and  to  all  other  forms 
of  exclusiveness.  That  there  is  a  "democracy -of  learning"  which 
embraces  men  and  women  who  live  in  every  state  and  every  land, 
and  which  gives  its  ennobling  inspiration  to  persons  of  every  class 


THE  TREND  IN  AMERICAN  EDUCATION  99 

or  race,  or  church  or  party,  and  which  is  going  to  aid  every  intellec- 
tual and  moral  interest  of  mankind  at  every  opportunity,  is  coming 
to  be  known  wherever  there  are  men  and  women  who  are  moved 
by  the  spirit  which  God  has  placed  in  every  human  breast.  It  is 
making  the  widest,  the  finest,  the  most  inspiring,  and  the  most 
influential  fraternity  that  the  world  has  ever  known. 

In  later  years  there  has  been  a  very  significant  enlargement  of 
the  understanding  that  the  true  functions  of  a  democratic  state 
justify  it  in  entering  upon  divers  educational  activities  outside  of 
the  schools.  It  is  coming  to  be  accepted  without  cavil  that  the 
state  may  not  only  build  up  a  state  library  for  the  use  of  state 
officials,  legislators  and  judges,  but  a  state  library  for  the  aid  of 
the  professions,  or  for  any  other  interest  which  may  be  aided  by  a 
collection  of  books  which  it  can  not  itself  easily  secure  or  maintain; 
that  books  may  be  loaned  from  the  state  library  to  any  one  needing 
them;  that  local  libraries  are  to  be  encouraged,  subsidized  and 
guided ;  and  that  traveling  libraries  may  be  sent  about  the  state  to 
quicken  study  in  every  direction.  This  tendency  goes  beyond 
libraries:  it  extends  to  museums  and  all  collections  which  may 
interest  and  instruct  the  crowd;  it  is  very  jealous  of  original  his- 
toric manuscripts  and  mementos;  it  sends  standard  pictures  to  the 
schools  and  all  manner  of  institutions,  and  it  gives  helps  to  art 
centers,  reading  circles,  study  clubs,  lecture  assemblies,  and  all 
other  intellectual  activities  whether  they  are  individual  or  asso- 
ciated. 

The  tendency  is  going  yet  further.  It  is  extending  scientific 
research  to  matters  concerning  the  public  health,  and  even  to 
commercial  and  industrial  activities.  It  would  extend  every 
facility  to  sane  and  logical  thinking  and  to  all  rational  doing. 
One  state  erects  laboratories  for  the  chemical,  microscopical,  and 
bacterial  examination  of  diseased  tissue;  another  analyzes  all 
drinking  water  sent  to  its  scientific  laboratories  and  determines 
whether  or  not  the  specimens  are  free  from  contamination ;  another 
conserves  the  animals  in  its  forests  and  propagates  the  fishes  in  its 
waters;  another  works  up  its  clays  into  forms  both  useful  and 
beautiful;  another  measures  the  carbon  in  its  coals;  another  tells 
its  farmers  how  to  add  to  the  potentiality  of  their  acres  and  what 
crops  will  command  the  readiest  markets;  and  yet  another  shows 
its  railroads  how  to  get  a  maximum  of  speed  and  hauling  power  at 
a  minimum  of  cost.  All  this  and  much  more  is  going  on — often 
all  of  these  things,  and  more,  in  the  same  state.  The  tendency  is 
growing  rapidly.  It  seems  destined  to  give  even  more  decisive 
turns  to  the  future  of  our  education  and  our  civilization. 


IOO  NEW  YORK  STATE   EDUCATION  DEPARTMENT 

The  truly  significant  thing  about  it  is  that  the  more  and  the 
better  it  is  done  the  stronger  is  the  popular  support.  There  is  no 
socialism  or  paternalism  about  it.  It  is  merely  the  outworking  of 
the  fundamental  American  doctrine  that  in  education  the  masses 
have  the  same  right  of  opportunity  as  the  classes.  It  is  using  the 
combined  political  power  to  gain  the  educational  results  in  a  short 
time  which  without  that  power  a  few  favored  people  may  get  in  a 
long  time,  and  often  keep  to  themselves  for  a  yet  longer  time.  It 
is  all  illustrative  of  the  inherent  spirit  of  the  country  and  of  the 
roads  which  that  spirit  is  bound  to  break  out  and  follow. 

The  growing  culture  -as  well  as  the  ever  developing  business  of 
the  country  is  quickly  reflected  in  our  schools.  There  is  no  country 
in  which  the  changes  .are  so  frequent  and  the  accumulations  so 
apparent,  and  the  progress  so  rapid;  and  there  is  none  in  which  all 
this  so  quickly  affects  the  situations  and  policies  of  the  schools. 
This  is  well  illustrated  in  the  architecture  and  the  multiplying 
adornments  of  the  newer  school  buildings  at  nearly  all  of  the 
centers  of  population."  It  appears  also  in  the  art  courses  which 
are  making  their  way  into  the  programs  of  the  schools.  The  great 
wealth  of  the  country  which  embellishes  and  cultures  so  many 
homes  does  the  same  for  the  schools — with  this  difference,  that 
the  influence  of  it  is  even  more  widely  and  sanely  exerted  in  the 
schools  than  in  the  homes,  because  the  schools  are  not  so  likely  to 
be  inherited  by  the  superficial  and  idle  rich,  with  all  that  is  implied 
thereby.  The  schools  are,  in  a  way,  becoming  more  and  more  the 
accumulating  and  distributing  points  of  the  country's  culture  as 
well  as  of  the  country's  justice  and  prosperity. 

Of  course,  the  large  fortunes  are  producing  some  excessive  and 
unwholesome  luxury  in  the  life  at  some  of  the  universities,  but 
there  is  no  more  democratic  and  leveling  institution  in  the  world 
than  an  American  university,  and  the 4  students  who  use  their 
wealth  grossly  and  live  riotously  are  no  less  likely  to  lose  standing 
in  the  common  sentiment  of  the  crowd  than  they  are  to  meet  their 
fate  in  the  semester  examinations. 

The  physical  training  which  is  now  required  very  uniformly  of 
the  mass  of  college  students,  and  the  extent  to  which  sports  have 
been  organized  are  giving  manifest  turns  to  our  newer  education. 
There  is  a  new  respect  for  health  and  a  new  enthusiasm  for  physical 
accomplishment.  There  is  a  new  valuation  upon  sport  and  a 
wider  interest  in  keeping  it  clean.  The  whole  thing  is  doing  much 
to  attract  youth  to  the  high  schools  and  colleges  and  is  exercising 
an  unmistakable  influence  upon  the  life  in  the  elementary  schools. 
Of  course  there  are  and  will  be  excesses,  but  on  the  whole  the  in- 


THE  TREND   IN  AMERICAN    EDUCATION  IOI 

fluence  is  good.  Children  endure  pain  with  less  whimpering;  life 
in  the  open  is  not  only  generating  new  power  but  creating  new 
ideals ;  and  the  thinking  of  young  people  in  both  city  and  country 
grows  more  sane  and  ambitious  through  the  striking  development 
of  physical  training  in  the  schools  and  of  organized  interscholastic 
sport. 

No  one  can  foresee  the  destiny  of  the  Republic,  but  that  there  is 
an  educational  purpose  abroad  in  the  land  which  has  never  before 
been  so  pervasive  and  so  ambitious  in  any  land  seems  clear.  It 
is  the  spirit  of  a  mighty  people,  gathered  from  the  ends  of  the 
earth,  enlightened  by  the  world  experiences  of  a  thousand  years. 
It  is  the  spirit  of  a  people  with  outlook  and  expectancy.  They 
expect  to  use  the  wealth  and  the  political  power  of  the  nation  to 
make  certain  that  every  son  and  daughter  of  the  nation  shall  have 
the  fullest  and  freest  educational  opportunity.  The  functions  of 
the  state  concerning  every  manner  of  educational  activity,  in  and 
out  of  the  schools,  are  being  steadily  enlarged  and  strengthened 
through  the  initiative  or  the  common  desire  of  the  multitude. 
Growing  appreciation  is  giving  greater  heed  to  the  advanced  insti- 
tutions and  bringing  them  to  the  aid  of  all  institutions  and  there- 
fore to  the  intellectual  quickening  of  the  entire  country.  Every- 
thing that  the  nation,  the  state  or  the  municipality  can  do  to  aid 
true  learning,  without  any  injustice,  it  is  to  be  made  to  do.  And 
the  learning  which  aids  doing  and  the  culture  which  is  the  product 
of  labor  are  to  be  of  the  most  worth. 


DC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


A     000  038  636     7 


